The ALBA Open Day, held last Saturday 5 May, received 2,321 visitors who could discover how this scientific facility works and what its main applications are.
Despite again this year the rain was present in its seventh celebration, the ALBA Open Day welcomed a record number of visitors: 2,321 people.
From 9:00 a.m. to 7:00 p.m., more than 100 volunteers, members of the ALBA staff, showed the facilities to the attendees and explained them the operation and characteristics of the electron accelerators’ complex, aimed at producing synchrotron light for analysing the properties of matter.
The event followed a free itinerary where visitors were able to see the devices where the electrons pass through or those used for manipulating the synchrotron light, to participate in fun demonstrations to know more about concepts like vacuum or pressure, microscopy or spectroscopy. New this year, the ALBA Open Day hosted an exhibition to highlight the role of women in science as well as an art exhibition on pinhole photography and solarigraphy, images taken with cans and that collect the trajectory of Sun, respectively. The area devoted to the youngest was also very crowded with experiments and activities for them. Besides, three conferences were given about particle accelerators (Caterina Biscari, director of ALBA), how synchrotron light is generated (Pep Campmany, researcher responsible of the insertion devices section) and why a synchrotron facility is a useful tool (Miguel Ángel García Aranda, scientific director).
>Read more on the ALBA Synchrotron website