Innovation Through Collaboration

NSLS-II Director Elke Arenholz reflects on a successful annual Users' Meeting, key project milestones, and discusses important upcoming science workshops that will help shape the future of the facility

May 27, 2025

It was a pleasure meeting so many of you at this year’s NSLS-II & CFN Users' Meeting. Thank you to everyone who attended and participated, and congratulations to this year’s award winners! I’d also like to extend my sincere appreciation to the Users’ Executive Committees and event organizers for their outstanding work in making the meeting a success.

This spring has been marked by a flurry of activity at NSLS-II, with a key DOE review, several workshops, and the unveiling of our new strategic plan. Thanks to the careful planning and coordination performed by our staff, we now have a clear roadmap toward our next major goals as the facility continues to grow and evolve.

In the fall, we are planning a series of scientific workshops to identify key questions in current/key focus areas and explore what new capabilities would be needed at NSLS-II to approach these questions. These workshops will build on the discussions started at the staff retreat late last year and several of the recent Users’ Meeting workshops. The dialogues we foster at these events will be important to the future of the facility, as they will help steer the direction of new beamline projects and an eventual accelerator upgrade. The voice of the user community is integral, and I encourage you all to participate.

NEXT-II and NEXT-III project updates

We continue to make progress on the NEXT-II beamlines. Both endstations for the Soft X-ray Photoemission and Scattering Imaging (ARI) beamline have been installed, and we expect to have the final site acceptance testing performed in early June. Additionally, we have started to assemble some of the in-house diagnostic components and started the infrastructure installations. The factory acceptance test for the photon delivery system for both ARI and the Soft X-ray Nanoprobe (SXN) beamline is scheduled to occur in the late spring, with delivery later this year.

Final integration and testing of the Coherent Diffractive Imaging (CDI) beamline front end and in-vacuum undulator will take place as we prepare for the instrument readiness review this summer. This involves testing the motion controls, power supplies, equipment protection systems, and instrumentation before performing a final survey.

The NEXT-III team is making significant progress in the design phase, with eyes set on CD-2/3 reviews for Subproject A in fiscal year 2026. Meanwhile, the scope for Subproject B has been finalized and includes three key efforts:

1. Construction of the Advanced Nanoscale Imaging (ANI) and Tender X-ray Nanoprobe (TXN) beamlines
2. Design and construction of the Advanced Materials Process (AMP) beamline
3. Upgrades to facility water pumps to support all NEXT-III beamlines

The AMP beamline is scheduled to enter its conceptual design phase in April 2025 and a new call for beamline proposals for subproject C (and likely subproject D) is planned for later this calendar year.  Previously reviewed proposals that were not selected for subprojects A or B will be encouraged to resubmit. 

Stay tuned for more updates as progress on these new beamlines continues!

Maintenance period update

The spring shutdown included a variety of installation and repair work. Most notably on the accelerator side was the installation of the new storage ring radio frequency (RF) solid state amplifier, which is replacing the klystron RF transmitter. We also reconfigured the instrumentation front end at 20-ID to perform a complex bend radiation hardness test as part of the NSLS-II accelerator upgrade development work.

Site Access Update

We’re excited to announce the opening of the new Science and User Support Center (SUSC, Bldg. 101), which now houses the Guest, User & Visitor (GUV) Center, badging office, and housing office. The trailer near main gate is now closed, making this new facility a welcoming first stop for guests and visitors. All new users and users with expired ID badges must check in at the GUV Center in the SUSC prior to proceeding through the security booths at the Lab’s entrance. If you have a valid ID badge for accessing the Lab site, you can proceed to the security booths at the Lab's entrance.

The SUSC building and GUV Center are open from 7 AM to 5 PM on Monday through Friday. The Housing Office is open Monday – Friday from 8 AM – 10 PM and on Sunday from 2 – 10 PM. If you arrive when the SUSC is closed but the Housing Office is open, you can use an intercom in the building's vestibule to contact a staff member and be buzzed in.

To access this new building, a road was added off the existing traffic circle before the main gate. This addition has altered the traffic pattern people are accustomed to, so I urge you all to use caution and practice situational awareness when entering and exiting the Lab. When you arrive at the traffic circle, yield the right-of-way to any pedestrians and bicyclists. You must also yield to any drivers who are in the traffic circle before you.

Thank you for your continued support, collaboration, and dedication. It’s a pleasure working with you, and I’m glad we’re keeping the momentum going together.

— Elke Arenholz, NSLS-II Director