The Swiss Physical Society SPG and the Paul Scherrer Institute PSI invite you to a training session on "Modern aspects of the physics of condensed matter" to PSI in Villigen AG.

 Lectures:

Polymer brush structures on polymer surfaces, Dr. C. Padeste, PSI

Nanomagnets as model systems, Prof. F. Nolting, PSI

X-ray phase contrast imaging, Dr. F. Marone, PSI

Magnetism and Superconductivity, Prof. C. Niedermayer, PSI / University of Konstanz

Roundtable Discussion:

Current Topics in Physics Education, Prof. A. Vaterlaus, Dr. C. Wagner, A. Lichtenberger, ETH Zurich

Evening lecture:

The proton accelerator HIPA as a tool for research, Dr. M. Seidel, PSI


Cost: SPG and the PSI take over the costs of meals and accommodation.
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The final program will be sent to the beginning of November to the participants.

User Offices play a key role in large scale synchrotron, FEL and neutron facilities. Lately, European projects like PaNData, Calipso, NMI3 or EuroFEL between such facilities seems to point towards the harmonization of workflows, software or procedures employed by User Offices. However, each facility has its own national constrains.

The present meeting is a first discussion forum of European User Offices. It was initially proposed after some discussions during European projects meetings like PaNData and it will become an opportunity to know each facility workflows and achievements as well as common worries and future developments.

Shedding light on correlated electrons

The 2015 MaNEP Winter School combines introductory courses with more specialized lectures in the field of correlated quantum matter. The school aims at a broad introduction to topics of current interest in condensed-matter physics. This year, a special focus is devoted to spectroscopies of materials with strong electron correlations, especially time-resolved techniques. Three long lectures will provide an introduction to these materials and their electronic structure, to the fundamental aspects of optics and non-linear optics in solids, and to superconductivity and topological superconductors. Five shorter lectures will cover: neutron scattering, recent advances on cuprate superconductors using photoemission and resonant spectroscopies, introductions to time-resolved spectroscopies and to the theory of non-equilibrium dynamics of strongly-correlated systems. The school targets an audience at the doctoral and post-doctoral levels. A background in general condensed-matter physics should be sufficient. All lectures are given in English.

A workshop will be held at the University of Huddersfield to discuss the development and application of future Muon sources.

Organised with the support of the European Union 7^th Framework Programme, this will be a joint meeting between the Accelerator Applications Network of EuCARD2 (http://eucard2.web.cern.ch) and the Muon Joint Research Activity within the Neutron and Muon Integrated Infrastructure Initiative (http://nmi3.eu).

The aim of the meeting is to bring together scientists and engineers involved in the development and application of accelerator-based muon sources to discuss and exchange ideas about the requirements for future facilities.
The meeting will consider new technologies required for the production of novel muon beams, such as Ultra Slow beams and the Muon Microscopes, while taking a forward look to new applications of muon techniques in academia and industry.

To coincide with the grand opening of Beamline 7.2W: macromolecule crystallography (BL7.2W: MX) and celebration of the International Year of Crystallography 2014, SLRI would like to announce the AWPX2014. The

This course is intended for young scientists and aims to provide better understanding of key concepts in protein crystallography with hands-on experience in X-ray data collection at BL7.2W: MX, data processing and structure determination.

Keynote Speaker: Prof. Dr. Chun-Jung Chen (NSRRC, Taiwan)

The main objectives of the workshop are the following:

• take a snapshot of the this fast developing field,Â
• examine how this technique combines with theoretical approaches,Â
• popularize the NAP-XPS technique among surface chemists and physical chemists.

The National Synchrotron Light Source II at Brookhaven National Laboratory will host the 12th International Conference on Synchrotron Radiation Instrumentation in New York City in July of 2015.

This event can be followed on Twitter @SRI2015NYC for up-to-date information on speakers, session topics, and events related to SRI 2015.

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The ISIS Molecular Spectroscopy Group will hold its next science meeting at the Cosener’s House, Abingdon on the 29th and 30th of January 2015. This year’s meeting will focus on the following thematic areas:Â

• Catalysis & Energy
• Nanostructured Materials
  
• Modelling & Simulation
• Quantum Matter
  
• Soft Matter & Biology

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Keynote lectures will be followed by a number of oral presentations on a given thematic area.

Synchrotron-based, time-resolved techniques provide unprecedented insights into various areas of applied and fundamental science, this being largely due to their unique capabilities of allowing for a direct view onto the constituent building blocks of matter (electrons, spins, atoms, and molecules) on their characteristic length- and time-scales.

Prominent examples are the detection of non-equilibrium phases of matter, the characterization of transient and metastable magnetic and chemical states and the real-time observation of light-harvesting materials and biological systems, just to name a few.

As such, there is an increased demand ofthe user community for high brilliance X-ray light sources with flexible time structures that could accommodate such time-resolved techniques covering the full spectral range from far-IR to hard X-rays.

In a series of foresight work-shops, HZB wishes to establish a discussion platform for future projects and research activities in concert with current and future users from universities, research institutes and industry. The aim of the dialogue is to reveal future scientific fields as well as expectations, needs and requirements for cutting edge science with synchrotron radiation.

HZB kindly invites you to join our workshop on ultrafast X-ray science in order to start or intensify a dialogue with us about future science and your requirements for successful experiments at our synchrotron.

The 10th SOLEIL Users' Meeting will take place on January 22nd and 23rd, 2015 at Polytechnique (Palaiseau) and at SOLEIL.The meeting provides an invaluable forum for the synchrotron radiation user community, presenting an important opportunity to obtain the latest information on beamline performance at SOLEIL, to hear about the latest and most exciting results obtained at SOLEIL and to share scientific, technical and practical issues about the synchrotron radiation use.

On the occasion of the 25th anniversary of the internationally known HERCULES Course, we will organize a three-week HERCULES School from July 6 to 24,2015 in Hsinchu, Taiwan where the National Synchrotron Radiation Research Center (NSRRC) is located. The NSRRC is a national laboratory which operates a 1.5-GeV synchrotron named Taiwan Light Source and is constructing another 3-GeV one called Taiwan Photon source. This 2015 Asia-Pacific Edition of HERCULES in TAIWAN, "Neutron and Synchrotron Radiation for Physics and Chemistry of Condensed Matter and Biomolecular Structure and Dynamics," is a three-week training course including a week of practicals and tutorials. It will be opened to PhD students, postdoctoral, young scientists working in the fields relate to physics, chemistry, biology, and materials science. The language of the course is English.

Training school for beginners on the small-angle X-ray scattering technique. It will be held at the Brazilian Synchrotron Light Laboratory (LNLS).

The main idea of this training is to help and build up user community at SAXS1 and SAXS2 beamlines at LNLS. The SAXS group will offer comprehensive hands-on training in synchrotron data collection and analysis for first-time synchrotron users.

In this edition, participants will receive information about basic principles of small angle X-ray scattering and learn how to collect data on SAXS1 and SAXS2. This will help participants to strength their proposal and prepare their first experiment.

The Australian Synchrotron's annual User Meeting showcases some of the best research and investigations undertaken at the facility, and provides our user community with updates on the latest developments and technical advances in synchrotron science, both at home and at our sister light sources overseas. Organised by the Australian Synchrotron User Advisory Committee, the 2014 meeting will again be held at the award-winning National Centre for Synchrotron Science (NCSS).

Topics:

• Advanced Materials
• Beamlines, Instrumentation and Techniques
• Biological Systems
• Earth and Environment
• Energy Materials
• Imaging
• Radiotherapy and Radiobiology
• Soft Matter
• Structural Biology
• Surface Science

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The New User Symposium offers an introduction to the services offered across the facilities under the operation of ANSTO, including synchrotron, accelerator and neutron based techniques. The annual one-day event is tailored to novice potential users of these techniques, and is to be held this year at the Australian Synchrotron’s National Centre for Synchrotron Science (NCSS). Aspects of the event include access arrangements, including available support, and some of the typical applications of techniques across biomedical research, materials and physical sciences and environmental fields.

For the first time in 2014, the New User Symposium will be held immediately before the Australian Synchrotron's annual User Meeting, 20-21 November, also at the NCSS.  Prospective users can take advantage of this co-location to learn more about the leading research being undertaken at the Australian Synchrotron, and latest advances in the fields of synchrotron science and techniques. Separate registration is required for the User Meeting.

The coherent light of synchrotrons and FEL sources has opened multiple opportunities for exploring the structure and properties of matter with lateral and time resolution that was not possible a decade ago. The workshop will be focused on recent advances and future prospects in imaging technologies and their applications. The main topics that will be tackled are phase-sensitive X-ray imaging, synchrotron X-ray tomography, coherent X-ray imaging methods (with X-ray optics and/or lensless) and ultrafast time resolved imaging using FELs. Special attention will be paid on progress in image analysis (reconstruction of 3D images and phase-retrieval algorithms) with reference to applications in different research fields, from medicine and biology to material science. Relevant topics, such as low-dose phase-contrast computed tomography and 3D coherent diffraction imaging, are in common with the European research network EXTREMA (Enhanced X-ray Tomographic Reconstruction: Experiment, Modeling, and Algorithms) MP1207 COST Action aimed at facilitating collaboration between X-ray tomography experimentalists and the mathematical image reconstruction community. In this joint event, presentations from experts in the field and topical round table sessions will illustrate current achievements and future developments.

Workshop topics

• Phase-sensitive X-ray imaging- X-ray tomography
• Coherent Diffraction Imaging
• Image reconstruction and phase-retrieval algorithms
• Applications

Topics of the round tables

• Low-dose phase
• contrast computed tomography
• From 2D to 3D Coherent Diffraction Imaging Â

In the last decades experiments based on synchrotron radiation and coherent radiation generated by free electron lasers (FELs) and conventional lasers have contributed a great deal to the understanding of the physics in novel superconductors. Although the origin of the superconductivity in these materials is still a pending problem, it is time now for a critical analysis of the results so far obtained and looking forward for a new roadmap. Aim of the workshop is to bring together some of the most expert scientists in the field to discuss the role that synchrotron and FELs sources can play for advancing our understanding of the superconductivity mechanisms in novel and exotic materials.

Invited Speakers

• Sergey Borisenko (IFW Dresden, Germany)
• Andrea Damascelli (University of British Columbia, Canada) abstract
• Donglai Feng (Fudan University, China) abstract
• Atsushi Fujimori (University of Tokyo, Japan) abstract
• Antoine Georges (Collége de France, France)
• Giacomo Ghiringhelli (Politecnico di Milano, Italy) abstract
• Makoto Hashimoto (SLAC National Accelerator Laboratory, USA) abstract
• Bernhard Keimer (Max Planck Institut für Festkörperforschung, Germany)
• Dragan D. Mihailovic (Jožef Stefan Institute, Slovenia)
• Luca Perfetti (École Polytechnique, France) - abstract
• Kosmas Prassides (Durham University, UK & Tohoku University, Japan) abstract
• George Sawatzky (University of British Columbia, Canada)
• Dirk van der Marel (Université de Genève, Switzerland)

Course Description

Aimed at senior undergraduate students, graduate students and post-docs, this workshop will offer a combination of classroom and experimental work to introduce participants to the single crystal structure determination techniques that can be applied to synchrotron-based single crystal X-ray diffraction. The program includes two hands-on activity sessions that will highlight the major techniques and introduce participants to the single crystal diffraction instrumentation at ChemMatCARS, Sector 15 of the Advanced Photon Source.Â

The school is limited to 20 participants for hands-on activities. In addition, a limited number of auditors may be accepted at the organizers’ discretion.

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Lecturers

• Charles Campana, Bruker AXS Inc.
• Josh Chen, Indiana University
• Yu-Sheng Chen, The University of Chicago
• Mati Meron, The University of Chicago
• Maren Pink, Indiana University
• Amy Sarjeant, Northwestern University
• Shao-Liang Zheng, Harvard University

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The International Conference on Data Sharing and Integration for Global Sustainability (SciDataCon) is motivated by the conviction that the most significant research challenges â€" and in particular the pressing issues relating to global sustainability â€" cannot be properly addressed without due attention to various issues relating to data.  SciDataCon aims to make explicit the connection between concrete and specific challenges to ensure environmental protection, economic prosperity and social well being along with the research questions that arise from these challenges and the necessary role of data policy, management and analysis in addressing these research questions. The effectiveness and credibility of research findings rely on the widest possible availability of quality-assessed and interoperable datasets.

Research data are essential to all scientific endeavours. The emerging cultures of data sharing and publication, open access to, and reuse of data are the positive signs of an evolving research environment. Nevertheless, several cultural and technological challenges are still preventing the research community from realizing the full benefits of these tendencies.

The Committee on Data for Science and Technology (CODATA) and the World Data System (WDS), interdisciplinary committees of the International Council for Science (ICSU) are together advancing this agenda by actively promoting effective data policies and good data management practices in the research community, to produce better science, which ultimately benefits society. Â As a major contribution to this effort, the two organizations are co-sponsoring and organizing a high profile international biennial conference, which will examine, in an integrated way, the data issues at the heart of the global research questions and in a manner that will have tangible benefit for research and society.

Professor David L. Bish
Geological Sciences, Indiana University.

Tuesday 4 November 2014
5.30pm (followed by a networking reception at 6.30pm)

Mars has been a subject of fascination and active study since at least the 19th century, and its surface and atmosphere have been analysed remotely by optical and spectroscopic methods. The two Viking landers, launched in 1975, ushered in a new era of in situ exploration of Mars, which has continued sporadically since that time. Studies of the surface of Mars culminated in two very successful landed missions, the Mars Exploration Rovers (landed in 2004) and Mars Science Laboratory (landed in 2012). Tremendous technological innovations have come from these missions, but our advances are far greater than these and include new ways to look at our own Earth.