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Synthesis

Synchro-yawn

May 1, 2006 | A version of this story appeared in Volume 84, Issue 18

The article on the Diamond Light Source is the kind of news your readership could do without (C&EN, Jan. 2, page 14). It lacks any new information worth reporting. The exact same article could have been written for every new synchrotron radiation (SR) facility built over the past 30 years, just by changing the names of the facility, of the country, and of the actors involved, starting with NSLS (Brookhaven), to Bessy (Berlin), ANKA (Karlsruhe), SLS (Villigen), and now Diamond.

Touting the benefits of SR to industrial users has been a required exercise for every new synchrotron building team. The same business model has been operative in every such instance. And in every instance, the subsequent industrial harvest has been woefully modest. In most cases, industry eventually pulled out of the facility, proving that, outside of biology, privileged access to SR has not proven to be the panacea its promoters dutifully claim it to be.

To structurally characterize and understand today's technologically promising materials, which more often than not do not display sufficiently extensive 3-D periodicity (a prerequisite for Bragg diffractometry), more powerful tools are required, such as the ultrafast electron microscope being developed at Caltech by Ahmed Zewail's group.

The glut of synchrotron radiation beamlines in Europe has less to do with a crying need for such instruments than with ongoing nationalistic science policies in Europe. Because an SR facility is downright cheap compared with other large-scale facilities, the temptation is strong to join the club by building one and giving it a sparkling name.

Hans-Peter Weber
Lausanne, Switzerland

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