ESRF – Page 4 – Lightsources.org

New enzyme-embedded plastic degrades rapidly

2024/08/012024/08/06

Scientists have developed a biosourced plastic embedded with an enzyme that ensures rapid biodegradation and compostability, overcoming the hurdles of currently used plastics. They used the ESRF to solve the structure of the enzyme. The results are published in Nature.

Plastic production reached a staggering 400 million tons in 2022, with packaging and single-use items making up a significant portion. The resulting waste often ends up in landfills, incinerators, or the environment, contributing to the growing crisis of plastic pollution.

Due to this situation, there is a burgeoning interest in biodegradable and compostable plastics as more sustainable alternatives. Polylactide (PLA) is the most widely used biosourced polymer, however, PLA degrades very slowly in home compost and soil.

Now scientists led by the company Carbios and the Toulouse Biotechnology Institute (TBI), in France, have developed a PLA-based plastic embedded with a specially optimized enzyme that ensures rapid biodegradation and compostability at room temperature through a scalable industrial process.

hey optimised the process used to achieve an engineered enzyme able to withstand the 170°C temperature required to introduce it in molten state PLA during the plastic production process. The new enzyme-embedded material, containing just 0.02% enzyme by weight, fully disintegrated under home compost conditions within 20–24 weeks, meeting all home composting standards. It also helped produce more biomethane, another source of waste recovery.

Part of this research required the structure determination of the enzyme, which the scientists acquired using the ESRF structural biology beamlines. This is the second Nature publication led by Carbios with data from the ESRF. Alain Marty, Chief Scientific Officer of Carbios, explains the long-term collaboration with the ESRF: “Since the early days of Carbios, TBI (Toulouse Biotechnology Institute), IPBS (The Institute of Pharmacology and Structural Biology) and Carbios have collaborated with the ESRF as synchrotron radiation plays an important role in this research. In particular, in this article diffraction data helped us unveil the structure of the enzyme to understand better the relation between the structure of the enzyme and its function. The resulting enzyme engineering work leads to an efficient enzyme that allows the plastic to self-biodegrade at room temperature.”

Image: The encapsulated enzyme CARBIOS Active, in granule form, when integrated directly into PLA-based packaging or products at the production phase, enables compostability at room temperature.

Credit: Carbios.

Mammals grew more slowly in the Jurassic than they do today

2024/07/242024/08/06

Analysis of two unique Jurassic fossil discoveries from the Isle of Skye (Scotland) have shown that mammals in the time of the dinosaurs grew more slowly and lived longer than mammals today. Synchrotron studies of the fossils at the ESRF contributed to the research. The findings are published in Nature.

An international team of researchers led by National Museums Scotland discovered two Krusatodon kirtlingtonensis fossils, one adult and one juvenile, both in Skye. These mouse-sized mammals lived around 166 million years ago. The specimens represent the only juvenile Jurassic mammal skeleton known to science, while the adult is one of the most intact mammal skeletons from this time period in the world.

The fact that both specimens, the juvenile and the adult, belong to the same species of early mammals is unique and has allowed groundbreaking comparative analysis into their growth and life history. This was possible thanks to X-ray computed tomography carried out in several laboratories, including cutting-edge facilities, notably the ESRF’s ID19 beamline.

The ages of the specimens at death were determined using X-ray imaging to count the growth rings in their teeth. The adult was found to be around 7 years old and the juvenile between 1 – 2 years, and still in the process of replacing its baby teeth.

Shift in mammal growing patterns

Today, small mammals have significantly shorter lifespans, some living as little as 12 months, and maturing quickly, losing their baby teeth and weaning within months of birth. The Krusatodon fossils reveal for the first time that the earliest mammals didn’t finish replacing their teeth until well into their second year of life, possibly later. This tells us that a fundamental shift in the growth patterns and life expectancy of mammals must have taken place during or after the Middle Jurassic.

The specimens were discovered decades apart, with the adult being one of the earliest Jurassic finds on Skye in the 1970s, while the juvenile was discovered in 2016.

A unique atlas of the human heart: from cells to the full organ

2024/07/172024/07/17

Scientists led by the University College London (UCL) and the European Synchrotron (ESRF), have, for the first time, imaged two whole human adult hearts, one healthy and one diseased, down to the cellular level in 3D, using an innovative X-ray technique called Hierarchical Phase-Contrast Tomography (HiP-CT). This new atlas of the heart can potentially lead to medical applications. The results are published in Radiology.

To study the human heart, researchers typically use clinical imaging techniques such as Ultrasound, Computed Tomography (CT) and Magnetic Resonance Imaging (MRI). While these methods are effective for diagnosing cardiovascular disease, they do not provide detailed structural changes across the different scales within the heart. For higher resolution, histology is required, which involves slicing donor organs into sections. Although this method offers more detailed information, it significantly limits the field of view.

Now a new synchrotron X-ray imaging technique, called HiP-CT, overcomes these limitations by providing a comprehensive and detailed 3D view of the entire adult human heart. “HiP-CT provides a global view of whole donor organs at unprecedented resolution, bridging the gap between traditional imaging and histology,” says Professor Peter Lee of UCL, HiP-CT project lead.

A team led by UCL and the ESRF, in collaboration with the Wellcome Sanger Institute, Siemens Healthineers, Great Ormond Street Hospital, Hannover Medical School, the Aachen Medical University, the Helios University Clinic Wuppertal, the University Medical Center of the Johannes Gutenberg-University Mainz, and the Laboratoire d’Anatomie des Alpes Francaises (LADAF) has imaged two entire adult hearts, one healthy and one diseased, using the HiP-CT imaging technique on beamline BM18 at the ESRF. “BM18 is currently the only place in the world where complete human organs can be imaged with such a high level of contrast, and we are still quite far from the limits of the beamline capabilities. The main limiting factor is the processing of the very large data produced by HiP-CT”, explains Paul Tafforeau, ESRF scientist.

Image: Multidimensional Analysis of the Human Heart in Health and Disease using Hierarchical Phase-Contrast Tomography (HiP-CT).

Credit: Brunet et al. Radiology.

Take-off! Researchers map fly neural networks controlling wing and leg movement

2024/06/272024/06/27

One of the main functions of the neural system is to coordinate movements of the body. In order to understand how brain controls adaptive motor behaviours, scientists have long been trying to decipher the neural circuit map down to the muscles.

Now researchers have connected the neurons from the fruit fly nerve cord, similar to the vertebrate spinal cord, with the muscles controlling the legs and wings. This sheds light on how the fly senses and controls movements of the legs and wings. Whilst connectomes in small animals have been mapped before, it is the first time that scientists find the synapse-level wiring diagram of motor circuits for a limbed animal.

Why the fruit fly? Drosophila melanogaster has a compact nervous system with sophisticated genetic tools and identified neurons with stereotyped function across individuals. “They are marvelously skilled at motor control, including walking and flying, despite their tiny nervous system”, explains John Tuthill, researcher at the University of Washington and corresponding author of the publication. Indeed, each of the flies’ legs is controlled only by 70 motor neurons (compared to 600 in a cat’s calf muscle) and only 29 motor neurons controlling each wing.

The fly has specialised muscles for power and steering in the wings. These wing muscles attach to different body parts: power muscles to the thorax and steering muscles to the wing hinge.

The team has now determined which pre-motor neurons in the fly’s version of the spinal cord, known as ventral nerve cord (VNC), coordinate motor neurons controlling the leg and wing. To achieve this, they used several techniques: electron microscopy, sparse genetic labelling, and X-ray holographic nanotomography (XNH) at the ESRF.

Image: The circuits controlling the wing steering (left) and the wing power (right) of the fruit fly.

Credit: Azevedo et al., Nature 2024

Manufacturing defects in silicon-based Li-ion batteries trigger degradation

2024/05/152024/05/22

Li-ion batteries are widely used in mobile devices, transportation and energy storage, but they have limitations, including durability and degradation over time. When and why defects and failure appear in commercial batteries is still mostly unknown.

Now scientists from the ESRF, the ILL and the CEA-IRIG, Materials Center Leoben Forschung GmbH and battery manufacturer VARTA Innovation GmbH have used non-destructive X-ray and neutron imaging at the ESRF and ILL, respectively, to determine one of the origins and causes of the degrading mechanism in silicon-based Li-ion batteries.

X-rays and neutrons analysis

The samples were industrially graded batteries that are currently being tested for future commercialisation and that include large amount of silicon. The difference with current batteries lies in the anode, which is often made of state-of-the-art graphite in commercial batteries. In the new batteries, the anode consists of a slurry mix of silicon and graphite composite. “This new anode configuration, with silicon in it, enables manufacturers to introduce a bigger quantity of lithium in the same space, increasing the capacity of the battery”, explains Jakub Drnec, corresponding author of the publication and scientist in charge of ID31.

In order to characterise the new materials and determine their behaviour, the team first used the ILL’s instrument NEXT, as neutrons are an optimal tool to observe the distribution of lithium in the battery. At NeXT, 3D high resolution neutron tomography is coupled with X-ray tomography to image the entire cell. Subsequently they analysed the samples on beamlines BM05 and ID31 at the ESRF in operando conditions, i.e. while they were charged and discharged. In particular, they tracked Li dynamics and the morphology of the composite and how it changed over time using the technique of small angle X-ray scattering (SAXS). They also used X-ray diffraction (XRD) to study the cathode charging and absorption X-ray tomography to investigate the voids created that can lead to mechanical failure.

“This is a unique multi-modal study where we have combined neutron and X-ray tomography data from the same battery together and got a full picture of what is happening”, explains Drnec. “It shows how vast and comprehensive our research is when we use both X-rays and neutrons”, he adds.

Silicon agglomerations

The results show that the way the slurry of materials is mixed during wet electrode processing is uneven, with large silicon chunks not being mixed with graphite, and this triggers a break of chemistry around the anode. That part of the battery then becomes inactive and the defects can cause mechanical failure in the cell. “What is surprising is that after the first charge of the battery we already observe this phenomenon”, says Drnec.

Image: Multimodal correlative data and 3D rendering of the cell. Top part: X-ray CT data. Middle part: neutron CT data. Bottom part: Combined NXCT data in false color. A 2D SWAXS CT slice is also shown in the measured position. Right: Integrated graphite intensity. Left: Integrated SAXS intensity. The insert highlights the various components and internal cell damage as observed with NXCT.

Credit: Lübke E. et al, Energy and Environmental Science, 14 May 2024.

The Long Read: The AI revolution

2024/04/022024/04/10

For what was once a purely technical subject, machine learning has hardly been out of the news. Beginning in late 2022, the world has had to come to terms with the impact of a number of groundbreaking, generative artificial-intelligence (AI) models – notably the ChatGPT chatbot by the US company OpenAI, and text-to-image systems such as Midjourney, developed by the US company of the same name. Everyday conversations cannot avoid the debate over whether we are living amid a fantastic new industrial revolution – or the end of civilisation as we know it.

All this popular controversy can detract from a quieter – but no less important – machine-learning evolution taking place in the scientific realm. Arguably this began in the 1990s, with greater computing power and the development of so-called neural networks, which attempt to mimic the wiring of the brain, and which helped to popularise AI as an overarching term for machines that ape human thinking. The real acceleration, however, has taken place in the past decade or so, thanks to the storage and processing of “big data”, and experiments with layered neural networks – what has come to be called deep learning.

Of this revolution, synchrotron users – who are among the world’s largest producers of scientific data – stand to be great beneficiaries. Machine learning has the potential to streamline experiments, reduce data volumes, speed up data analysis and obtain results that would otherwise be beyond human insight. “We’ve been amazed in many ways by the results we could produce,” says Linus Pithan, a materials and data scientist based at the German synchrotron DESY, who ran an autonomous crystal-growth experiment at the ESRF’s ID10 beamline with colleagues last year. “The quality of the online data analysis was astonishing.”

Formerly a member of the ESRF’s Beamline Control Unit where he helped develop the new BLISS beamline control system, Pithan is well placed to test the potential of machine learning in synchrotron science. The flexibility of BLISS was necessary for him and his colleagues to integrate their own deep-learning algorithm, which they had trained beforehand to reconstruct scattering-length density (SLD) profiles from the X-ray reflectivity of molecular thin films. Unlike the forwards operation – calculating a reflectivity curve from an SLD profile – this inverse problem can be painfully tedious to solve even for an experienced analyst: the data are inherently ambiguous, because they do not include the phase of the scattered X-rays. Indeed, it is a demanding task for a machine too, which is why at the beamline Pithan’s group made use of an online service known as VISA to harness the ESRF’s central computer system.

The success of the automation was immediately apparent (Figure 1). From the reflectivity measurements, the deep-learning algorithm could output SLD profiles and thin-film properties such as layer thickness and surface roughness in real time, and thereby stop in-situ molecular beam deposition at any desired sample thickness between 80 Å and 640 Å, with an average accuracy of 2 Å [1]. “The machine-learning model was able to ‘predict’ results within milliseconds,” says Pithan. “In a way, we transferred the time that is traditionally needed for the manual fitting process to the point before the actual experiment where we trained the model. So by the time of the experiment, were able to get results instantaneously.”

The ESRF has been anticipating a rise in machine learning for many years. It forms part of the data strategy, and is one of the reasons for the ESRF’s engagement in various European projects that support the trend: PaNOSC, which is a cloud service to host publicly funded photon and neutron research data; DAPHNE, which aims to make photon and neutron data accord to “FAIR” (reusable) principles; and most recently OSCARS, which promotes European open science. Vincent Favre-Nicolin, the head of the ESRF algorithms and scientific data analysis group, is wary of claiming that machine learning is always a “magical” solution, and points out the toll it can take on computing resources. “But for some areas it makes a real difference,” he says.

Image: Painstaking manual segmentation of ESRF tomographic data reveals the vasculature of a human kidney for the Human Organ Atlas project. It also provides valuable training data for deep-learning algorithms that will be able to do the same job much faster

Fertilisation under the X-ray beam

2024/03/192024/04/08

After the egg has been fertilized by a sperm, the surrounding egg coat tightens, mechanically preventing the entry of additional sperm and the ensuing death of the embryo. A team from the Karolinska Institutet has now gained this new insight through measurements at the X-ray light sources BESSY II, DLS and ESRF.

Fertilization in mammals begins when a sperm attaches to the egg coat, a filamentous extracellular envelope that sperm must penetrate in order to fuse with the egg. Now an international team of researchers has mapped in detail the structure and function of the protein ZP2, an egg coat filament component that plays a key role in regulating how egg and sperm interact with each other at fertilization.

“It was known that ZP2 is cleaved after the first sperm has entered the egg, and we explain how this event makes the egg coat harder and impermeable to other sperm,” says Luca Jovine, Professor at the Department of Biosciences and Nutrition, Karolinska Institutet, who led the study. “This prevents polyspermy – the fusion of multiple sperm with a single egg – which is a fatal condition for the embryo.”

The changes in the egg coat after fertilization are also crucial to female fertility by ensuring the protection of the developing embryo until this implants in the uterus. The new knowledge may therefore have implications for the development of non-hormonal contraceptives that interfere with the formation of the egg coat. Moreover, the study explains egg coat-associated forms of female infertility.

“Mutations in the genes encoding egg coat proteins can cause female infertility, and more and more such mutations are being discovered,” explains Luca Jovine. “We hope that our study will contribute to the diagnosis of female infertility and, possibly, the prevention of unwanted pregnancies.”

Paganini’s “Il Cannone” sophisticated X-ray analysis at the ESRF

2024/03/112024/03/12

The European Synchrotron, the ESRF, played host to the most famous violin in the world: ‘Il Cannone’ violin, crafted in 1743 and played by the great virtuoso Niccolò Paganini. The Municipality of Genoa and the Premio Paganini teamed up with ESRF scientists to use the world’s brightest synchrotron to carry out X-ray analysis of the iconic violin.

The conservation of ancient violins of historical and cultural high interest, such as “Il Cannone”, Niccolò Paganini’s favourite violin, which ranks among the most important musical instruments in the history of Western music, requires constant monitoring of their state of health. The Municipality of Genoa in Italy and the Premio Paganini have developed a programme with the ESRF for an in-depth monitoring and analysis of the behaviour of the violin in different situations, in order to better preserve and understand this precious historical artefact. In this context, the Municipality of Genoa and its conservators have teamed up with ESRF scientists to define a measurement protocol and perform a unique experimental X-ray study – using non-destructive X-ray techniques – of the structural status of the wood and the bonding parts of the violin. Working day and night, they used a technique called multi-resolution propagation phase-contrast X-ray microtomography at the ESRF’s new BM18 beamline to scan the violin.

‘ll Cannone’ was built in 1743 by the great Cremonese luthier Bartolomeo Giuseppe Guarneri, also known as ‘del Gesù’. Paganini enjoyed an almost symbiotic relationship with what he called “my cannon violin” for its acoustic prowess. The ‘Cannone’ became an exceptional partner for the virtuosities of the musician, who developed new violin techniques by exploiting the instrument’s potential to the full. Niccolò Paganini left the ‘Cannone’ to his hometown, Genoa, “so that it may be perpetually preserved.” The violin has been kept in Palazzo Tursi, the seat of the Municipality of Genoa since 1851. The ‘Cannone’ is rarely played. Some famous violinists have performed with the ‘Cannone’ in concerts in Italy and abroad; however, playing the precious instrument remains a privilege reserved for the winner of Genoa’s biennial Premio Paganini International Violin Competition.

The technique applied at the ESRF has been widely used for palaeontology over the last two decades. This technique has reached a new level of sensitivity and resolution thanks to the ESRF’s new Extremely Brilliant Source, which, since its commissioning in August 2020, provides experimental performances at least 100 times better than before. Combined with the unique capabilities of the new BM18 beamline, it offers the unprecedented capability to reconstruct a 3D X-ray image of the complete violin at the wood cellular structure level, with the possibility to zoom in locally anywhere in the violin, down to the micrometric scale. As a result, the experiments carried out at the ESRF provide a full 3D vision of the conservation status of the violin, but also a super-precise representation of the details of the bold structure of “Il Cannone”, which possesses a uniquely powerful voice, and also full mapping of the previous interventions and reparations done in the past by lute makers.

Image: Close-up view of Paganini’s “Il Cannone” on the experimental station BM18 at the ESRF.

Credit: ESRF/P. Jayet

Jessica McBeck wins the ESRF Young Scientist Award 2024

2024/02/062024/02/07

Jessica McBeck, a geologist and computer scientist from the University of Oslo in Norway, has been awarded the ESRF Young Scientist Award (YSA) 2024 during the ESRF User meeting. She received the award “for her outstanding contribution to the understanding of multi-scale fracture network development in rocks.”

When will an earthquake happen? Questions like this are central in Jessica McBeck’s research. And the ESRF is plays a big role in it: “The ESRF is extremely important in my research as it allows me to delve inside the rock in 4D, and in particular at the stress conditions at depths within the crust, where the most damaging earthquakes occur”.

McBeck has a background as a geologist and a computer scientist, developing software and carrying out experiments with sand, which is an analog for rocks. An avid programmer, today, she uses computer science to answer geological questions. “Without the ESRF, my research would be entirely limited to numerical models, and having only numerical models prompts the question of how realistic they are”, she says. McBeck is part of the team working in François Renard’s ERC project Break-through rocks, which relies on a collaboration between the Njord Centre at the University of Oslo and the ESRF. Her experiments take place on ID19 and BM18.

As a student, McBeck focused on long-term fault development over hundreds and millions of years including tens of hundreds of earthquakes, but thanks to synchrotron analysis she can now study the damage that occurs on the rock in the weeks and months prior an earthquake.

The jury of the YSA highlights that “her combination of finite element modeling with quantitative measurements, and more recently machine learning, is a huge step toward a comprehensive understanding of the macroscopic failure of rocks”.

More than half of McBeck’s publications feature ESRF data and her work, according to the jury “potentially has a broad impact for the prediction of earthquakes”.

Image: Jess McBeck on ID19 during an experiment

Credit: J. McBeck

#EBSstory Asteroid Bennu’s samples investigated at the ESRF

2024/01/222024/01/25

Scientists from the Schwiete Cosmochemistry Laboratory at Goethe University Frankfurt in Germany and the University of Ghent in Belgium have come to the ESRF to study minuscule samples from Asteroid Bennu, after they were brought back to Earth by NASA’s OSIRIS-REx mission on 24 September 2023.

The asteroid Bennu is a scientific gem. Asteroids are airless remnants left over from the early formation of our solar system about 4.6 billion years ago. Early analysis led by NASA has indicated that asteroid Bennu appears to be very rich in carbon and shows evidence for hydration, which scientists believe can shed light on the origin of life and the Solar System. “It is a primitive carbonaceous asteroid, a so-called near-Earth object located within the asteroid belt between Mars and Jupiter and, because it hasn’t undergone the geological processes known for example from Earth and other planets, we think its composition can provide us with clues about the beginning of the Solar System”, says Dr. Beverley Tkalcec, lead scientist in the team at ESRF and geoscientist at the Goethe University Frankfurt and specialised in space samples.

After the return of the OSIRIS-REx mission, NASA sent out samples of the asteroid to scientists across the world for further investigation, including long-term ESRF users from the Goethe University Frankfurt (Germany) and University of Ghent (Belgium). They have come to the ESRF this week to analyse some of the precious samples on the high-energy ESRF beamline ID15A. “The targeted minerals in our samples are less than half a millimetre in size and the concentration of some of the elements we want to find is of the range of parts per million”, explains Laszlo Vincze, professor from the University of Ghent and leading the synchrotron analysis of the samples.

The researchers want to track and quantify individual minerals enriched with Rare Earth Elements (REE), as tracers of asteroidal processes. These minerals might have changed after being in contact with water. “It is like finding a needle in a haystack, so we need a really high flux to study these samples and this is exactly what the ESRF offers today with the new EBS”, adds Vincze. The experiments use X-ray fluorescence combining high incident energies of 90 keV with a 300 nm resolution scanning capability and a new high-count rate high-efficiency fluorescence detector.

Image: The asteroid Bennu

Credit: NASA

New insights into what happens in cells in early Alzheimer’s

2023/12/142023/12/14

Researchers led by the ESRF, the European Synchrotron, have found that amyloid oligomers play a role in speeding up mitochondrial energetics during the early stages of Alzheimer’s, in contrast to what has been previously found in more advanced Alzheimer’s brain tissues.

The origin of Alzheimer’s disease, which affects 30 million people worldwide, is still not clear despite an international research effort and significant progress in research. And yet, identifying the factors driving this incurable neurodegenerative disease is essential to find better ways to diagnose Alzheimer, delay its onset and prevent progression. “Before understanding the pathology, we need to understand the biology”, explains Montse Soler López, head of the Structural Biology group at the ESRF and co-corresponding author of the study.

Alzheimer’s is an incurable disease that normally appears after the age of 65. However, changes in the brain begin 20 years before the disease appears. “We believe that malfunctioning of the mitochondria can take place 20 years before the person shows symptoms of the disease”, explains Soler López. For a long time, researchers have focused on the amyloid plaques in the brain as the potential cause of the disease. However, this hypothesis is currently being reconsidered.

Now Soler López’s team, together with scientist Irina Gutsche at the Institut de Biologie Structurale (CNRS, CEA, Université Grenoble Alpes) and researchers at the EMBL, conduct a new line of research focusing on aging factors, such as mitochondrial dysfunction. Mitochondria are often referred to as the “powerhouse of cell” because of their essential role in energy production. Over time, mitochondria suffer oxidative stress and this leads to their malfunction. A recent finding indicates that individuals with Alzheimer’s may exhibit an accumulation of amyloids within mitochondria, challenging the previously belief that amyloids were solely present outside neurons.

The ESRF Council appoints next Director General

2023/11/302023/11/30

The ESRF Council has appointed Jean Daillant as the next Director General of the ESRF, the European Synchrotron.

A soft matter physicist, Jean Daillant has been Director General of the SOLEIL synchrotron since 2011. Under his guidance, SOLEIL has become a leading facility among the medium-energy synchrotron radiation sources. He is the current Chair of LEAPS, the League of European Accelerator-based Photon Sources, which aims to promote scientific excellence and strengthen the cooperation between synchrotron and X-ray free electron laser facilities to support an innovative and sustainable European Research Area. He also holds the role of Spokesperson of the Analytical Research Infrastructures in Europe (ARIE).

Jean Daillant will take over on 1 September 2024 from Francesco Sette, who, during a close to sixteen-year mandate, has overseen the implementation of the entire Upgrade Programme of the ESRF to become the world’s first and leading fourth-generation high-energy synchrotron radiation source.

#EBSstory How can iron in the moon and meteorites help to understand the origin of the Solar System?

2023/10/232023/11/07

Using ESRF-EBS, scientists from Leibniz University Hannover are investigating the origins of the Solar System by studying samples from the moon and micrometeorites.

Meteorites are remnants of material from the early solar system. Our Earth accumulates on average 100 tons per day of these extraterrestrial samples, which largely exhibit spherical shapes. The presence of iron in them provides insights into the formation and composition of the solar system.

Equally, detecting the different forms of iron in moon samples can shed light on the geology of the moon, its history and how celestial bodies form in our solar system.

Regarding the moon, after the Apollo mission, back in the 70s scientists studied several samples and found that iron was very scarce. However, recent studies have found that iron and other metals are more abundant in certain zones in the moon, notably the darker zones, than in the Earth. This effectively disputes the hypothesis that the moon’s metal comes from the Earth’s debris after it collided with a Mars-sized planet called Theia, 4.5 billion years ago.

“Iron in the moon is a very valuable resource as it can be used to construct infrastructure and equipment, for example in the case of a potential lunar space station to carry out research”, explains Franz Renz, professor at Leibniz University Hannover (LUH) and leader of the team.

The team came to the ESRF with samples from both the moon and meteorites. They used the technique of Synchrotron Mössbauer Source to characterise the iron-rich microscopic meteorites, of a diameter of around 100 microns on average, collected from an up to 3.8-million-year-old continuous sedimentary record in the Atacama Desert in Chile. Because this desert is the oldest and driest temperate desert on Earth, it preserves the samples in optimal condition to monitor changes in flux, types and composition of extraterrestrial material over time.

Image: Lunar samples.

Credit: F. Renz.

Scientists uncover a rare component in Da Vinci’s Mona Lisa paint

2023/10/112023/10/17

Leonardo da Vinci (1452-1519) is considered one of the most important figures of the Renaissance. Whilst he wrote numerous manuscripts bearing on his many sources of interest such as engineering or architecture, he left very few clues on his painting materials. His taste for experimentation was strikingly present in his craft: The build-up of the different layers in each of his paintings is different, as are the materials used.

Now researchers from the laboratory Photophysique et photochimie supramoléculaires et macromoléculaires (CNRS/ENS Paris-Saclay), the Institut de recherche de chimie Paris (CNRS/Chimie ParisTech – PSL), the Centre de recherche et de restauration des musées de France (Ministère de la culture), the Louvre Museum, the Laboratoire d’archéologie moléculaire et structurale (CNRS/Sorbonne Université) and the ESRF, the European Synchrotron, have studied a microsample of the preparation layer of the Mona Lisa to shed light on Da Vinci’s painting methods. To get more clues about Da Vinci’s palette and technique, they also analysed several fragments from the Last Supper, another masterpiece by Leonardo.

The team used the techniques of synchrotron radiation high-angular resolution X-ray powder diffraction (SR-HR-XRPD), micro X-ray diffraction (µXRD) and micro Fourier-transform infrared spectroscopy (μ-FTIR) at the ESRF’s ID22, ID13 and ID21 beamlines, respectively. The results show the presence of a very uncommon composition in both the Mona Lisa’s ground layer and the Last Supper’s ground and paint layers.

Image: Artistic impression of the Mona Lisa.

Credit: I. Fazlic, M. Cotte & V. Gonzalez.

ESRF hosts Lightsources.org members’ meeting in Grenoble

2023/10/042023/10/06

Science communicators from light source facilities within Lightsources.org, the global collaboration of 23 synchrotrons and 7 Free Electron Lasers, gathered at The European Synchrotron (ESRF) last week to share knowledge, ideas, and strategic plans. The in-person meeting, the first to be held in Europe since before the pandemic, also focussed on developing a special programme of activities to celebrate the 20^th Anniversary of Lightsources.org in 2024.

Guest speakers included Terry O’Connor, EMBL’s Head of communication, and Daniela Antonio, CERN’s Social media and community manager, both of whom shared insights into their strategies, activities and priorities in the ever changing landscape of 21^st century science communication.

Delphine Chenevier, Head of communications at the ESRF, comments, “Since we last hosted a Lightsources.org collaboration meeting, the ESRF has undergone a major upgrade to a fourth-generation high-energy synchrotron. This has significantly increased our scientific capabilities. It was wonderful to be able to show colleagues several beamlines where ESRF staff outlined the research that can now be done across a range of fields including health, materials, environmental sciences, cultural heritage, and palaeontology.”

Isabelle Boscaro-Clarke, Diamond’s Head of Impact, Communication and Engagement, adds “One of the most valuable aspects of being a member of Lightsources.org is the connections you develop with colleagues in similar roles around the world. Our in-person meetings give us the opportunity to share both the triumphs and the challenges and provide the time needed to have in-depth discussions. These discussions help us to strengthen our communications programmes at an individual facility level and plan the future development of the Lightsources.org collaboration as it continues to provide one voice for the brightest science.”

Lightsources.org was established in 2004 and, as the 20^th Anniversary approaches, the collaboration will be focusing on a new Vision and Strategic Plan for 2024-2044 along with a special programme of activities to raise the profile of Lightsources.org and its members throughout 2024.

If you are interested in becoming a member of Lightsources.org, please visit our About Lightsources.org page or contact Silvana Westbury, our Project Manager, at webmaster@lightsources.org

To keep up to date with light source news, career opportunities, events, proposal deadlines and upgrade information from our member facilities, please subscribe to our weekly e-newsletter

Top Image: Lightsources.org members outside the ESRF, Tuesday 26th September 2023. Left to right: Agnieszka Cudek, SOLARIS, Poland, Ana Belén Martínez, ALBA, Spain, Laia Torres Aribau, ALBA, Spain, Beth Schlesinger, APS (Argonne), USA, Emma Corness, Diamond, UK, Miriam Arrell, SLS/SwissFEL (PSI) Switzerland, Silvana Westbury, Lightsources.org, Isabelle Boscaro-Clarke, Diamond, UK, Florentine Krawatzek, BESSY II (HZB), Germany, Wiebke Laasch, DESY Photon Science, Germany, Delphine Chenevier, ESRF, France

Credit: ESRF

Trilobite’s last meal revealed by synchrotron microtomography

2023/09/282023/10/04

The gut contents of a 465 million-year-old fossilised trilobite were imaged at the ESRF using synchrotron microtomography technique. The results, published in Nature, shed light on the feeding habits and lifestyle of one of the most common and well-known fossil arthropods. The research fills a fundamental gap in the understanding of trilobite ecology and their role in Paleozoic ecosystems.

Trilobites are among the most iconic of fossils and formed a highly diverse, abundant and important component of marine ecosystems during most of their 270-million-year-long history from the early Cambrian period to the end Permian period. More than 20,000 species have been described to date.

Despite numerous fossil specimens, the feeding habits of these animals have had to be inferred indirectly, because no known fossil specimens with internal gut contents have previously been reported. This knowledge gap limits the ability to understand trilobites’ ecological roles, which in turn affects the overall understanding of the ecosystems that they inhabited. A specimen of the trilobite Bohemolichas incola, with partly visible shelly gut contents, was present in a Czech public collection, but the inability to image and identify the individual shell fragments without destroying the fossil limited its research potential.

A team of researchers led by Per Erik Ahlberg at Uppsala University, Sweden, and Valéria Vaškaninová at Charles University, Czech Republic, came to the ESRF to investigate this rare fossil using propagation phase-contrast synchrotron microtomography, at ESRF ID19 beamline. The technique enabled the scientists to non-destructively image all the shell fragments in the gut in 3D and at high resolution. The result was a complete map showing the position and identity of each shell fragment in the gut.

Image: The trilobite Bohemolichas incola.

Credit: Jiri Svoboda