Following the Government's announcement of $37M for new guides, instruments and sample-environment apparatus on May 12th, we have made a number of key steps in setting the project up.
Firstly, our top-level Bragg Institute Advisory Committee has endorsed the basic notion of building a second SANS machine like QUOKKA, a backscattering spectrometer and a neutron radiography/tomography/imaging station, along with the necessary guides and sample-environment apparatus.
We will next flesh out more of the details in a large common workshop, with our user community and overseas experts on 27-28 August. A detailed announcement will go out shortly. The workshop is open to all interested parties.
We have also reconstituted the Beam Instruments Advisory Group, which gave us regular advice during our original instrument construction project between 2000 and 2007, under the chair of Dr. Dan Neumann (NIST Centre for Neutron Research, USA). Other members of the Beam Instruments Advisory Group include: Ken Andersen (ILL), Craig Buckley (Curtin U.), Michi Furusaka (U. of Hokkaido, Japan), Ian Gentle (Australian Synchrotron & U. of Queensland), Eberhard Lehmann (PSI, Switzerland) and Greg Warr (Sydney U.).
Finally, we have placed advertisements for 5 key positions: a project engineer/group leader along with four scientists to project manage (1) the back scattering spectrometer, (2) the radiography/tomography/imaging station, (3) the 2 cold guides, and (4) the new suite of sample-environment apparatus (particularly high-field magnets and low-temperature apparatus).
Published: 05/06/2009