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T E R E S A V E R S Y P . C O M A l b a S y n c h r o t r o n

VISITING THE ALBA SYNCHROTRON, Cerdanyola del Valls

On Wednesday, 20th July, I visited with great pleasure, with other fellows from the

Association of Physicists from Spain, the Alba Synchrotron. ALBA was inaugurated in

March of the past year and is now to start routine operations. South of a line joining

Paris with Trieste ALBA is the only national Synchrotron Radiation Facility in Europe.

The Alba Complex consists of three buildings: the Technical Building, the Main Hall

and the Office/Personnel wing. The latter confers to the complex its characteristic

snail shape.


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Entrance to main building

The synchrotron is an electron accelerator, destined to produce extremely brilliant

beams of light over a very wide range of the electromagnetic spectrum. The unique

characteristics of this light allow to determine with huge precision the atomicstructure and properties of matter. It has wide applications in Biology (e.g. in study of

biological structures, as proteins and in analysis of viruses and bacteria), in

Biotechnology, in health and pharmaceuticals, in nanotechnology (nanometric

designs, e.g. chips), in Physics (e.g. determination of the electronic structure of fluids

and solids), in Chemistry (e.g. improvement of processes of catalysis in chemical

reactions), in Surface Science, in Environmental Science (e.g. detection and location

of trace contaminants in soils and plants), in Palaeontology (e.g. non-destructive

analysis of fossils) and also in Cosmetics.

Our guide, Jordi Marcos, about two and half hours, lead us throughout the complex,

giving us information about general data and technical data of some facilities. In this

synchrotron, electrons are produced from a cathode at 1000 degrees Celsius and are

accelerated in a linear accelerator (LINAC), 10 meters in length, by high frequency

electric fields and further accelerated in a circular Booster synchrotron, 249,6 m of

perimeter (BOOSTER RING), and finally, once the electrons reach the nominal working

energy they are injected into a third accelerator called STORAGE RING, 268,8 m of

perimeter, and are stored for many hours.


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Linac Scheme, Booster Ring and Storage Ring

LINAC: electrons are produced and accelerated reaching speeds of 0,99987 c

(c= speed of light), equivalent to an energy of 100 MeV (100 millions

electronvolts)

BOOSTER RING: electrons are accelerated reaching speeds of 0,99999998 c,

equivalent to an energy of 3 GeV in 0,160 seconds, thrice.

STORAGE RING: electrons are stored to a current of 400 mA. Synchrotron

Light is generated in Insertion Devices and in dipolar magnets. Insertion

Devices are sophisticated systems that deliver tailor made light with

extremely high brilliance.

FRONT ENDS: these devices extract Synchrotron Light from ring and

separate the vacuum systems from ring and beamlines.

The electrons circulating in the Storage Ring are subjected to magnetic forces, bydifferent magnets, that curve their trajectory, losing energy in the form of intense

beams of light with wavelengths ranging from the infrared to the X-ray region.


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General view inside the tunnel


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Storage Ring

Magnet of Storage Ring


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RF cavity, to boost electrons

In all the process, it is very important to get a vacuum environment to avoidinteractions between electrons and residual gas molecules, and to have a protection

system for residual X-rays.

Each beamline is designed for use with a specific technique for a specific type of

research, so, Synchrotron Light is sent to experimental stations where scientists

exploit it for their research.


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Storage Ring (left) and Beamline device (right)

Tube where photons are guided (Synchrotron radiation). Photons are produced

tangentially to trajectory of electrons.


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ALBA has a total capacity to host at least 33 beamlines, 7 of which are built within the

initial capital Project. Between beamlines we can distinguish two groups: the first one

includes soft-energy photons (from the visible to soft X-ray region) and in the second

we have hard X-rays. For example, the first are used in photoemission electron

microscopy or to study magnetic materials, and the second in crystalline and non

crystalline diffraction experiments (e.g. proteins).

MISTRAL, soft X-ray microscopy beamline for biological applications (for example, toprovide insight into the internal structure of whole cells).


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XALOC, macromolecular crystallography beamline, to study structures ofmacromolecules and complexes.


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Now we have to optimize electron orbits said Jordi. In the future there are a

second-phase beamline proposals, concretely eight more.

ALBA Synchrotron is a research hub for University departments and scientific

centers; ALBA is expected to initially host more than 1000 researchers per year from

both the public and the industrial sectors. ALBA will be open to academic, industrial

research from abroad and technological innovation.

End of the visit

For more information: www.cells.es

Teresa Versyp, 21th July 2011
http://www.cells.es/http://www.cells.es/http://www.cells.es/

visiting alba sychrotron-eng

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