NSLS-II & CFN Users' Meeting Celebrates Togetherness and Great Science

Brookhaven users, staff, and leaders gathered in person, for the first time in years, to share research and discuss the future

September 16, 2024

After five years of virtual-only gatherings, the annual National Synchrotron Light Source II (NSLS-II) and Center for Functional Nanomaterials (CFN) Users’ Meeting returned as a combined on-site/remote event, with most of the 531 registrants — representing 32 countries and 140 institutions — participating in person. Held May 13-17 at the U.S. Department of Energy’s (DOE) Brookhaven National Laboratory, the meeting focused on the continued growth and impact of NSLS-II and CFN, which are DOE Office of Science user facilities at Brookhaven. 
 
The meeting’s main plenary session was held in Brookhaven’s Berkner Hall on Tuesday, May 14, between days of science workshops. After a brief welcome by CFN Users Executive Committee (UEC) Chair Laiba Bilal, Brookhaven Lab Director JoAnne Hewett took the stage. She conveyed her enthusiasm for the meeting’s on-site format, although she acknowledged that the COVID-19 pandemic had led to great improvements in Brookhaven’s remote research capabilities. The development of off-site access to tools and instrumentation, as well as improved data infrastructure, has allowed Brookhaven to become accessible to a new population of researchers from various geographies and backgrounds. This aligns with Brookhaven’s goal to improve its diversity, equity, and inclusion efforts, which is a major focus, she said — one that requires the contributions of the entire Lab community.

Hewett summarized some of the many ways that the Laboratory is growing, including ongoing development of the new Science and User Support Center within the future Discovery Park, the expanding array of cutting-edge techniques and tools at CFN, and the construction of Brookhaven’s newest particle accelerator, the Electron-Ion Collider. She also discussed the excellent progress being made to continue building out the NSLS-II facility to its full capacity of beamlines. 

“NSLS-II is extremely important to Brookhaven,” she said. “The broad spectrum of science that a light source enables is truly amazing, and our light source is enormously productive.”

The next speaker was Erik Johnson, the interim director of NSLS-II, who gave an update on the status of the facility and the many changes that are ongoing, not only physically but within the overall science climate. There have been many “twists and turns” over the last year, he said, such as changes in DOE structure, the realignment of its science programs —the Biological, Environmental & Planetary Science Division and the Physical Science and Research Operations Division — and the search for the new NSLS-II director, which was nearing completion at the time of the Users’ Meeting and has since been announced.

“All of this is happening because we want to best support the mission of NSLS-II,” Johnson said. 

The number of NSLS-II users in 2024 is already a record high, and 2000 users are expected by the end of the fiscal year. 

“I think it’s going to be a banner year for us,” he said. 

He shared some of the many research highlights from the last year, which included many studies published in high-impact journals and featured on journal covers, and he summarized the ongoing development of new beamlines. These include the three beamlines that make up the NSLS-II Experimental Tools II (NEXT-II) project: the Coherent Diffraction Imaging (CDI) beamline, set to spring to life later next year, and the Soft X-ray Nanoprobe (SXN) and NanoARPES and NanoRIXS (ARI) beamlines, which are projected to be available to users by 2027. Looking even further ahead, there is plenty to be excited about, such as the NEXT-III project, which will add another eight to 12 beamlines in the next decade, and the NSLS-II upgrade, which will optimize the accelerator and beamlines. 

Johnson said the NSLS-II community is also looking forward to the facility’s 10-year first-light anniversary, which will be commemorated in the fall and winter with some special events. In the meantime, be on the lookout for new online content that will lead us up to this milestone. 

CFN Director Chuck Black then took the microphone. In his remarks, he celebrated the renewed spirit of collaboration and togetherness that had returned to CFN in the last year. 

“In 2023, we chose to do not-lonely work,” he said, showing a photo collage of get-togethers and collaborative moments at CFN. “This is what I’m happiest about.

Black updated the crowd on the continued growth of CFN, which hosted 655 users in 2023 — the most ever! And the facility is incorporating “a ton” of new instrumentation and capabilities, including atomic layer etching, rapid thermal processing, and an inert atmosphere option at CFN’s 2D materials research tool, the Quantum Material Press. He talked about the forthcoming new quantum scanning transmission electron microscope, which will enable groundbreaking studies of the electronic properties of materials. A new high performance lab space is currently being built for this highly sensitive instrument.

He also described a new project that will establish a novel approach to research: the development of a “nanoscience exocortex,” a team of artificial intelligence (AI) agents that can search databases, suggest techniques, understand software that users and researchers might need, and know how to use specific instruments. 

“AI is poised to fundamentally change the way science is done,” Black said. 

Linda Horton, the DOE associate director of science for basic energy sciences (BES), was next on stage. She began with a rundown of the many leadership changes that have taken place in the Office of Science, then she listed some of the highlights of the enacted fiscal year 2024 and requested 2025 budgets, which are generally favorable, particularly for BES.

She also discussed a topic that is important to many of the attendees: the new goals of the BES Advisory Committee. These charges include assessing the impact of CFN and the other four DOE Nanoscale Science Research Centers (NSRCs) and identifying what new or upgraded facilities will best serve the Office of Science — and the country — in the next 10 years. 

The result of this analysis of the NSRCs was very positive, with the committee concluding that those facilities have had a major impact on materials and nanoscience research and have also become a great source of trained scientists and engineers. 

The upgrades and new facilities considered include the NEXT-II and NEXT-III suites of beamlines, as well as the eventual NSLS-II accelerator upgrade. 

After lunch, attendees also heard flash talks from Silvana Westbury, the director of lightsources.org, and Branden Brough, the director of the National Nanotechnology Coordination Office, who both joined the meeting remotely. 

Then, the Julian Baumert PhD Thesis Award was presented to this year’s winner, Juanita Hidalgo, who is now a postdoc at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Hidalgo gave a talk based on her thesis work at the Georgia Institute of Technology, titled “Structure-property relationships in lead halide perovskites for solar cells.” 

Winners were also announced for several other awards. The two 2024 NSLS-II UEC Community Service Awards went to Lead Technician Tom Langdon, for his work within the three beamlines that make up the Structural Biology Program and its partner cryoEM facility, and Mercy Baez, the NSLS-II and Laboratory for BioMolecular Structure user administrator, for her efforts to improve the overall user experience.

This year’s high school poster session boasted 120 attendees, who came out to show support for the impressive research projects that were represented. The winners were: In first place, Abigail Lam of West Islip High School, whose poster was titled “Identification of Microplastics Isolated from Sediments Across Long Island”; in second place, Ryan Deegan of West Islip High School, whose poster was titled “Analyzing C. elegans as a Cancer Model Using Infrared Microspectroscopy”; and, in third place, Parker Barry of Eastport South Manor Junior/Senior High School, whose poster was titled “Novel APO structure of Beta Lactamase from Burkholderia multivorans.” 

The graduate student/postdoc poster awards went to Yuxiang Peng of Stony Brook University, Semih Cetindag of Brookhaven National Laboratory, and, in a tie for third, Yichen Gan and Varun Kankanallu, both of Stony Brook University. 

After the award announcements and a coffee break, there was a new event: a live version of the popular and funny NSLS-II UEC Show, hosted by NSLS-II UEC Vice Chair Matthew Whitaker and guest hosted by NSLS-II/LBMS Science Communicator Denise Yazak. The show’s guests were Brookhaven Lab Director JoAnne Hewett, NSLS-II Deputy Director for Science Qun Shen, and Dava Keavney, the program manager for X-ray and Neutron Scattering Facilities with DOE BES. Topics discussed ranged from the lighthearted to the serious, including musical instruments, Starbucks mugs, favorite elements, establishing an ombudsman at Brookhaven, the NSLS-II upgrade, and the need for more science communication at U.S. light sources.

That evening, a lively group of nearly 100 attendees, vendors, and meeting organizers moved off site to enjoy an excellent banquet dinner and socialization at Danford’s restaurant in picturesque Port Jefferson Harbor. 

The two Users’ Executive Committees would like to thank all sponsors of the 2024 joint Users’ Meeting.

Brookhaven National Laboratory is supported by the Office of Science of the U.S. Department of Energy. The Office of Science is the single largest supporter of basic research in the physical sciences in the United States and is working to address some of the most pressing challenges of our time. For more information, visit science.energy.gov. 

Follow @BrookhavenLab on social media. Find us on Instagram, LinkedIn, X, and Facebook. 

2024-22074  |  INT/EXT  |  Newsroom