Director's Message
Dear Colleagues:
Emilio
Mendez, Director, Center for Functional Nanomaterials
It is now official: the CFN is ready for full operations as a user facility for nanoscience research. We achieved that milestone – CD 4b, as it is labeled in DOE-speak – on March 21, 2008, one month ahead of schedule.
I’m sure you join me in heartily congratulating everyone who worked so hard to bring the CFN to full operations status. At a celebration acknowledging them in the spacious CFN lobby last week, we heard from key individuals, including DOE project manager Joe Eng and Brookhaven project manager Michael Harrison, who spoke about the road that so many traveled together to reach this destination. Ahead of us, now, is wonderful science on the nanoscale.
As I anticipated in the fall 2007 newsletter, two new staff members have joined the CFN in the last six months: Mircea Cotlet and Jerzy Sadowski. Mircea comes from Los Alamos National Laboratory, where he was a staff scientist and is now part of the Soft & Bionanomaterials group at the CFN. Jerzy was an associate professor in Tohuku University, Japan, and has joined the Interface Science & Catalysis group. In addition, we have two new technicians, Edward Baker and David Elling, whom we have attracted to the CFN from other Brookhaven departments.
Also since that newsletter, we’ve seen the setting up of all the equipment and the completion of all the facilities. You’ll read about recent activities in the clean room in the articles by Rick Osgood and Aaron Stein.
We have also hosted two workshops, one on electron microscopy, jointly with Hitachi, and the second on nanoscience opportunities for the high-tech industry, as described in some detail later.
Almost coinciding with the move to the new CFN building, we saw a significant increase in the number of proposals to use the facilities. I am happy to report that that increase has been maintained -- and I trust that we’ll see even more growth in the number of users once the word goes around that we are completely "in business."
Looking ahead, on April 14 we will meet with the CFN’s Science Advisory Committee. We will present to them our research and facility plans for the next three years, in preparation for the DOE Operations Review that will take place on May 7-9. We look forward to a productive meeting with the SAC and to their comments and recommendations.
The CFN users will have an important role in the Operations Review. We will invite users to make presentations or to prepare posters of their work at the CFN, and we are planning a closed-door lunch for the users with the review team. In the next few days, you’ll be hearing individually from Grace Webster, the CFN’s user coordinator.
May will be a full month for all of us. Just ten days after the Operations Review, we will hold the 2008 Joint NSLS and CFN Users’ Meeting, on May 19-21. This year’s theme is "Lighting Our Way to a Renewable/Sustainable Energy Future," and we will hear from individuals currently involved in this area of research, including Cherie R. Kagan, University of Pennsylvania; Ian Robinson, University College of London; and George Crabtree, Argonne National Laboratory. Please mark the dates on your calendar and register soon.
I hope to see many of you at the Review and/or at the Users’ Meeting.
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