Latest-News – Lightsources.org

Capturing nanoparticles with two-frame X-ray movies

2026/09/042026/09/10

Two-colour X-ray pulses record the same sample at two moments in time.

One big dream of ultrafast science has been to watch changes in nanoparticles or biomolecules on their natural timescale. Experimentally, this can be realized by taking two snapshots of the same nanoscale object only femtoseconds (millionth of a billionth of a second) apart. A new capability of the European XFEL has recently enabled a big step towards the realization of this dream: the X-ray laser can produce subsequent flashes of two different colours, that are bright enough to image a particle twice within femtoseconds. However, a big challenge remained: no detector is fast enough to record the two snapshots separately—they end up on top of each other in a single image, comparable to a double-exposure photograph. Scientists now successfully employed two complementary methods to disentangle two diffraction patterns captured by the same X-ray detector. The results by an international team of researchers have been published their results in two separate articles in Nature Communications.

While both take advantage of the different colours or photon energies, one method exploits the capability of the detector to discern energy levels for each individual pixel, while the other uses mathematical reconstructions. Its inventors call the latter method Dichography. One of the leading scientists compares the technique to an extreme high-speed camera: “To my knowledge, these are the fastest nanoscale movies ever recorded, if by movie we mean multiple frames of the same object,” says Alessandro Colombo from the Department of Physics at ETH Zurich in Switzerland.

Read more on the European XFEL website

Image: A double exposure image can picture the same subject at different points in time. Disentangling the two events can be challenging. However, in this famous photograph, it can be assumed that inventor Nikola Tesla was not in the room when the electric discharge occurred.

Credit: Dickenson V. Alley. License: CC-BY-SA

In memory of Ada Yonath: a pioneer of structural biology

2026/09/012026/09/10

The ESRF joins the global scientific community in mourning the loss of Professor Ada Yonath, one of the most visionary and inspiring scientists of our time, and a long-standing user, advisor and friend of our facility.

In 2009, Ada Yonath was awarded the Nobel Prize in Chemistry, together with Sir Venkatraman Ramakrishnan and Thomas A. Steitz, for her pioneering work on the structure and function of the ribosome. This groundbreaking achievement opened an entirely new chapter in structural biology and revealed, in unprecedented molecular detail, how genetic information is translated into proteins.

The ESRF was privileged to play a pivotal role in this scientific journey. From the facility’s earliest days, Ada Yonath and her group from the Weizmann Institute of Science were among the most frequent visitors to our macromolecular crystallography beamlines, at times bringing around 500 samples every month for analysis. Datasets collected on ID13, and later on the ID14 and ID23 beamlines, underpinned many of the group’s landmark results. The extreme radiation sensitivity of ribosomal crystals drove Ada and her collaborators to adopt cryo-macromolecular crystallography, a methodology that went on to transform structural biology worldwide.

Ada Yonath gave generously of her time to the ESRF beyond her own experiments. As a member of the ESRF Science Advisory Committee, her feedback directly helped shape successive upgrades of our instrumentation.

Read more on the ESRF website

Science communication in the spotlight at SNIB2026

2026/08/282026/08/29

Lightsources.org is delighted to be heading to the SNIB2026 conference in Hamburg next month. Delegates will have the opportunity to attend a Science Communication Workshop delivered by communication specialists from HZB, DESY and the European XFEL.

The German Conference on Research with Synchrotron Radiation, Neutrons, Ions and Accelerators at Large-Scale Facilities is being held at the Universität Hamburg from the 8th – 10th September and will be attended by hundreds of researchers involved in a wide range of research fields.

Workshop Description: A 45 minute practical session led by communications specialists from German science institutes operating light source facilities. This session is aimed at developing your science communication skills. By the end of this workshop, you will have a crafted short synopsis of your work to aid your future science communication activities. The workshop will be held at 12.30pm on Tuesday 8th September.

Workshop facilitators: Florentine Krawatzek (HZB BESSY II) , Wiebke Laasch (DESY), Florian Steinkröger (DESY), Marieke Sander (European XFEL), and Thomas Reintjes (European XFEL)

To join us for this workshop, please register via the SNIB2026 website

Giving solid-state batteries a squeeze keeps them from short-circuiting

2026/08/282026/08/29

SLAC and Stanford researchers found that compressing solid-state battery material reduced the formation of lithium-filled intrusions called dendrites, leading to faster charging and longer battery life.

Key takeways:

A SLAC/Stanford University research team found they could prevent short-circuiting of solid-state batteries by deflecting the dendrite propagation direction using mechanical compression.
They provided direct evidence that dendrites start in the interior rather than merely at the surface of the electrolyte, settling a long-standing debate within the field.
The results could have implications for future battery design, by incorporating built-in mechanical compression or electrolytes with more defect-free interiors that suppress dendrite initiation.

Lithium-ion batteries power transportation and grid storage and enable our digital lives, but these ubiquitous batteries require frequent recharging and can fail over time.

To make batteries more reliable and longer lasting, researchers are exploring how to replace liquids inside batteries with a solid ceramic substance that could improve their performance.

But researchers must first overcome a big problem: cracks filled with lithium that form within the solid material during charging, causing the batteries to quickly short-circuit. When that happens, devices powered by these batteries become useless.

Researchers have long debated whether these cracks and the lithium metal inside them, called dendrites, form at the surface or inside the solid material – a key insight needed to figure out how to stop them from forming.

Now, in a study published in the journal Nature, researchers have discovered a way to track these dendrites and suppress them enough to keep the battery from short-circuiting.

Read more on the SLAC website

Shipwreck glass reveals insights into waste-form durability

2026/08/252026/08/29

Historic glass artefacts, especially those submerged in marine environments for centuries, serve as natural testbeds for long-term material stability. Understanding how glasses corrode over decades or centuries is critical for a wide range of applications, from cultural heritage conservation to the safe immobilisation of nuclear waste.

Until now, lab-based accelerated corrosion tests have been used as proxies – but how well do they mirror real-world behaviour? Researchers from the University of Sheffield and their marine archaeology and materials science collaborators tackled this question in their paper, published in Applied Geochemistry. The team analysed ancient lead-silicate glass ingots recovered from the 18th century shipwreck of the HMS Albion and compared them with laboratory-weathered analogues. Using micro-X-ray absorption spectroscopy at Diamond’s I18 beamline, they probed element redistribution and corrosion layer development.

When glass is immersed in saline, i.e. oxygenated seawater for extended periods, its surface layers evolve through ion leaching, new phase formation (such as clays or zeolites) and structural collapse – all of which affect long-term durability. Accelerated lab tests simulate this but often differ in time scale, solution chemistry or mechanical stress, which raises the question: Do accelerated tests capture the full complexity of real glass corrosion?

In this study, the team analysed shipwreck-altered lead-silicate glass (with visible corrosion layers up to several hundred microns thick) and compared the leached layers, element migrations (e.g., Pb, Si, Ca) and secondary mineral formation with artificially corroded analogues in lab immersion tests.

At Diamond’s I18 beamline, the team used micro-focused XAS and XRF to map elemental speciation and spatial distribution across corrosion layers.

Read more on the Diamond website

First positrons for the Future Circular Collider

2026/08/242026/08/27

At Paul Scherrer Institute PSI, first positrons have been successfully produced at a test source for CERN’s proposed next-generation particle collider, which could succeed the Large Hadron Collider. The source, installed at the X-ray free electron laser SwissFEL, uses new technologies including high-temperature superconducting magnets to achieve a high yield of positrons. The achievement shows the feasibility of the positron-source concept and marks an important milestone in developing the technologies needed for electron-positron colliders.

In Brief:

A test source installed at SwissFEL at PSI has successfully produced the first positrons for CERN’s Future Circular Collider (FCC).
A major technical challenge facing electron-positron colliders is producing and capturing enough positrons
The source uses new technologies such as high-temperature superconducting magnets to achieve markedly higher positron yields, required for the FCC.

In a bunker underground at the Paul Scherrer Institute PSI in Aargau, Switzerland, positrons have now been generated at the proof-of-principle test source. “These are the first positrons for the Future Circular Collider project, so it’s an important milestone,” says Paolo Craievich. The physicist from the PSI Center for Accelerator Science and Engineering co-leads the PSI Positron Production project, known as P³, together with Riccardo Zennaro.

The Future Circular Collider (FCC) is a proposed 91-km particle accelerator, currently under study as a possible successor to the Large Hadron Collider in the 2040s. Housed in a tunnel beneath the French-Swiss border region near CERN at an average depth of 200 metres, the collider will smash electrons into positrons – their antiparticles. This will open new paths for exploring fundamental questions about the nature of the universe that lie beyond the reach of current colliders.

One of the collider’s major technical challenges is producing enough positrons and efficiently collecting them into a beam – something existing technologies cannot yet do on the scale required. Researchers at PSI have therefore spent the past five years developing a more powerful positron source, now installed at SwissFEL.

Read more on the PSI website

Image: The first positrons were successfully produced at a proof-of-principle source at SwissFEL at PSI. Now that the concept has been shown to work, researchers will scale up positron yield to the levels required for the Future Circular Collider at CERN.

Credit: © Paul Scherrer Institute PSI/Mahir Dzambegovic

Gabriella Carini named CHESS director as facility readies for the future

2026/08/242026/08/27

Gabriella Carini has been appointed director of the Cornell High Energy Synchrotron Source (CHESS).

She will begin Oct. 1.

Carini, who has held leadership positions at the Brookhaven laboratory and at SLAC National Accelerator Laboratory for more than two decades, currently oversees Brookhaven’s scientific programs in instrumentation, accelerator science, quantum technologies, microelectronics and advanced research infrastructure.

Carini is appointed a professorship in the Sibley School of Mechanical and Aerospace Engineering in the Cornell Duffield College of Engineering.

The appointment comes at a pivotal moment for CHESS, the only synchrotron located at and operated by a university in the United States. As scientific challenges grow increasingly complex and interdisciplinary, CHESS is expanding its capabilities through major investments in advanced instrumentation, high magnetic field science, artificial intelligence-driven experimentation and new beamlines designed to serve emerging scientific communities.

”Gabriella brings a remarkable combination of scientific vision, technical expertise and leadership experience to this role,” Provost Kavita Bala said. “As an internationally recognized leader in her field, she understands both the cutting-edge technologies that advance modern discovery and the collaborative culture required to operate a world-class user facility. We are delighted to welcome Gabriella to Cornell.”

Carini succeeds Joel Brock, who will step down on Oct. 1 after serving as CHESS director since 2013. During his tenure, Brock oversaw significant modernization efforts, strengthened the facility’s national user program, guided the completion of the CHESS-U upgrade and navigated a new partner-funding model.

Read more on the CHESS website

How microscopic plankton played a major role in the formation of limestone in the Cretaceous seas

2026/08/212026/08/27

A collaborative team of micropaleontologists, geochemists, and physicists from ISTerre (CNRS/Université Grenoble Alpes), CEREGE, Institut Néel, SOLEIL, and Rutgers University provides new insights into the mechanisms of skeletal formation in Nannoconus, an extinct calcareous microplankton that played a major role in biocalcification in the Cretaceous seas.

For nearly 35 million years, the exoskeletons of this genus have contributed to massive carbonate accumulations on the seafloor, potentially impacting seawater chemistry. Despite their geohistorical importance, the fine-scale skeletal organization and the associated calcification processes have remained largely unresolved.

The Nannoconus cone-shaped exoskeleton consists of an assemblage of micaliths, themselves composed of imbricated calcitic components, but until now their microstructure was not resolved at scales relevant for discussing biomineralization processes. By combining X-ray ptychographic computed tomography (PXCT) on the SWING beamline at the SOLEIL synchrotron with scanning electron microscopy, this study provides the first three-dimensional reconstruction of a Nannoconus micalith at nanometric resolution, below the thickness of its constituent lamellae.

Read more on the SOLEIL website

History written in bone: FT-IR Spectroscopy in the study of ancient cremations

2026/08/202026/09/10

A team of researchers from Poland and Portugal investigated cremated human remains recovered from prehistoric funerary urns discovered in northern Poland. Using, among other techniques, infrared spectroscopy at the CIRI beamline of the SOLARIS Centre, the scientists found that water availability within the urns played a key role in the chemical transformations occurring in bones after cremation. Their findings provide new insights into post-burial processes and contribute to a better understanding of ancient funerary practices.

Bone is a valuable source of information about the past. By studying skeletal remains, archaeologists and anthropologists can reconstruct the diet, health status, and migration patterns of ancient populations. During the Iron Age in present-day Poland, cremation was the dominant funerary practice. The cremated remains were subsequently deposited in ceramic urns or directly in the ground.

Exposure to high temperatures causes a series of physicochemical changes in bone. First, the organic components, including lipids and proteins, undergo degradation. At temperatures above 700 °C, the mineral phase of bone, known as bioapatite, recrystallizes. After burial, the degradation continues over hundreds or even thousands of years. The course of bone diagenesis is influenced by numerous factors, including time, pH, and the chemical composition of sediments filling the urns. Understanding these processes is essential for reconstructing ancient cremation practices.

A team of researchers investigated cremated human remains and associated soil sediments from four prehistoric funerary urns recovered from well-preserved cemeteries dating to the Iron Age and the Roman Period in Czarnówko and Miłoszewo, northern Poland. Two urns had intact lids, one was partially covered, and one remained uncovered.

Read more on the SOLARIS website

Image: Results of chemometric analysis of FT-IR spectra of bones from open and closed urns U1 and U3. Photograph of the cist grave from Czarnówko. Photos of urns U1 and U3.

How the “unicorn of the seas” got its helix

2026/08/182026/08/20

A narwhal tale with a twist

Up to two metres long and twisted into a perfect spiral: The narwhal’s tusk is one of the most unusual structures in the animal kingdom. An international research team, including scientists from the Paul Scherrer Institute PSI, has now for the first time deciphered how this helix is organised inside the tooth – with a surprising twist. At the nanometre scale, the building blocks of the spiral rotate not just one way, but in two opposite directions.

King Frederik III knew the true origin of unicorn horns, and in the 17th century he sent an expedition to Greenland to probe the reality behind the precious horn. That’s because the mythical creature lives there, in Arctic waters, and has fins rather than hooves. The expedition was successful and bestowed on the Danish ruler a throne made entirely of “unicorn horns” – and with that, prestige and power in Europe. Even though the legendary horn is not a horn at all, but “merely” a tooth.

A tooth, however, that is quite unique in the animal kingdom. While other long teeth – such as the tusks of elephants and walruses, or the incisors of beavers – simply follow a curved shape, the male narwhal’s tooth grows forwards in a screw-shaped form. Usually it is the left upper canine that twists in an elegant counterclockwise spiral, piercing the upper lip and reaching lengths of up to two metres – sometimes up to half the animal’s body length.

It was precisely this unusual growth that aroused the curiosity of an international and interdisciplinary research team. Using state-of-the-art X-ray methods, the researchers wanted to find out whether the direction of rotation of the visible spiral was already determined by the arrangement of its nanometre-sized building blocks.

Read more on the PSI website

Image: Narwhals – often called the “unicorns of the sea” – have fascinated people for centuries with their long tusks. Now an international research team has used X-ray light to reveal the internal structure of this unique tooth for the first time, from nanometre to centimetre scale.

Credit: © Carsten Eqevanq, Greenland Institute of Natural Resources, North West Greenland (2021)

SLAC researchers uncover copper’s surprising melting behavior at extreme temperatures

2026/08/132026/08/20

Finding provides insights into design for heat-resistant fusion chamber.

Key takeaways:

Researchers used SLAC’s electron camera to watch copper atoms melt in real time.
The team uncovered a key parameter that allowed the copper’s crystal lattice to deteriorate slowly instead of collapsing as predicted.
By combining imaging with molecular dynamics simulations, researchers hope to uncover promising materials for fusion energy.

Future fusion power plants aim to recreate the heart of a star here on Earth to power our future energy needs. While the core fusion plasma will burn at hundreds of millions of degrees, the surrounding structural components must handle sudden, punishing heat loads that rival the extreme temperatures faced by spacecraft upon reentry into Earth’s atmosphere. Copper and its alloys are primary candidates for handling these intense heat fluctuations, making it vital to understand exactly how the metal behaves when pushed to its melting point.

Now researchers at the Department of Energy’s SLAC National Accelerator Laboratory and collaborators have captured an exquisitely detailed, step-by-step look at copper atoms as they underwent extreme thermal heating. Published in Nature Communications, the results revealed a key parameter that allowed copper’s crystal lattice to melt steadily, rather than collapse instantaneously as earlier simulations predicted.

Read more on the SLAC website

Go Farther, Charge Faster: Crack-Resistant Silicon Anodes

2026/08/122026/08/20

Developed a crack-resistant silicon anode material to reliably achieve high energy density and fast-charging performance for EV batteries.

Summary

A joint research team from POSTECH, Seoul National University, and LG Energy Solution has proposed a new design strategy to overcome the fracture problem of silicon anodes, a promising next-generation material for electric vehicle (EV) batteries. The study was recently published in the online edition of Nature Communications. Although silicon can store significantly more energy than conventional graphite, its practical application has been limited by severe volume expansion and contraction during charge–discharge cycles, which causes particle fracture. To address this challenge, the researchers incorporated crystalline lithium fluoride (LiF) into the silicon anode, simultaneously enhancing its strength and Young’s modulus. This approach significantly improved both mechanical durability and fast-charging performance. The study represents a major step toward the commercialization of high-energy-density EV batteries by satisfying two critical requirements at the same time.

Background

The performance of electric vehicle (EV) batteries is largely determined by two factors: how far a vehicle can travel on a single charge and how quickly the battery can be recharged. Conventional graphite anodes are highly stable, but their energy storage capacity is approaching its theoretical limit. Silicon, by contrast, can store nearly ten times more energy than graphite, making it one of the most promising next-generation anode materials. However, silicon undergoes significant expansion and contraction during charging and discharging. Repeated volume changes cause the particles to fracture and the electrode structure to deteriorate, ultimately shortening battery life. Previous studies have primarily focused on increasing the material’s Young’s modulus to reduce deformation. In contrast, relatively little attention has been paid to improving its strength, which is essential for preventing fracture and maintaining structural integrity under repeated volume changes.

Methodology

The research team developed a strategy to form crystalline lithium fluoride (LiF) within silicon monoxide (SiO)-based anode particles. They first introduced lithium into the particles and then infused fluorine, allowing it to react with the lithium to generate crystalline LiF inside the particles. Based on the Hall–Petch relationship¹, the researchers optimized the size of the LiF crystallites to maximize particle strength while simultaneously increasing the material’s Young’s modulus. They also formed a surface protective layer that facilitated the transport of both lithium ions and electrons. The particle structure and electrochemical performance were subsequently characterized using electron microscopy, X-ray analysis at the 4C beamline of PLS-II, and electrochemical measurements.

Read more on the PAL website

Fertilizer made from local rocks could help feed hungry in Africa

2026/08/122026/08/13

Researchers in Morocco develop method for turning syenite rock into cheaper, more-efficient alternative to regular potassium fertilizer

Food insecurity is a major problem in many parts of the world, particularly Africa where more than 300 million people regularly go hungry. Now, using the Canadian Light Source (CLS) at the University of Saskatchewan, researchers from Morocco have developed a way to produce fertilizer from local African rocks, which could make it easier for farmers to grow the crops needed to feed local residents.

African soils, especially in central Africa, are rich in organic matter and have lots of water, but farmers still need fertilizers to provide important macronutrients like potassium, which strengthens plants’ ability to absorb water, improves disease resistance, and increases crop yields. Most potassium fertilizers come from potash, mined from underground deposits formed by ancient, evaporated seabeds.

However, potash is an imperfect source of potassium for African farmers for several reasons. First, it comes from far away – the biggest potash deposits are in the northern hemisphere, in Canada, Russia, and Germany, making it an expensive resource that is vulnerable to supply chain disruptions.

Second, the potassium salts in potash are highly soluble, so while the plants can take up some of the nutrient, large amounts leach away into the groundwater and surface water and are lost. Finally, the chlorine in the fertilizer contributes to soil salinity and pollutes groundwater.

Abdellatif Elghali, professor at University Mohammed VI Polytechnic in Benguerir, Morocco, and his colleagues have been looking for ways to turn local potassium-rich syenite rocks into a cheaper and more efficient alternative fertilizer.

Read more on the CLS website

A synchrotron uncovers the secrets of 40-million-year-old flies

2026/08/122026/08/13

Researchers from the University of Łódź, MSc Alicja Pełczyńska and Associate Professor Agnieszka Soszyńska, in collaboration with an international team of scientists from Poland, Ukraine, Germany, and Denmark, used synchrotron imaging to unravel the mystery of the extinct fly genus Kelneria, one of the most abundant inhabitants of the European amber forests approximately 40 million years ago. The findings were published in the journal Arthropod Systematics & Phylogeny.

Today, this genus is completely extinct, but its disappearance is only part of the mystery. Kelneria possessed a highly unusual anatomy. Most remarkable were the male genitalia, which are uniquely reduced, measuring only fractions of a millimetre, with their individual components so tightly packed that they overlap one another. As a result, conventional light microscopy could not resolve their detailed structure.

A breakthrough came, among other techniques, with synchrotron radiation X-ray micro-computed tomography (SRµCT), performed at the POLYX beamline of the SOLARIS National Synchrotron Radiation Centre. Micrometre-resolution images enabled researchers to produce three-dimensional reconstructions and perform a virtual dissection of the fossil flies. For the first time, it became possible to reconstruct the anatomy of this extinct group in detail and compare it with that of its living relatives.

Read more on the SOLARIS website

Image: Kelneria specimen preserved in amber (left) and its three-dimensional reconstruction based on synchrotron radiation X-ray micro-computed tomography (SRµCT; right). The enlargement shows the highly reduced male genitalia, whose morphology was reconstructed in detail for the first time using synchrotron imaging.

More than just viscous: researchers examine movement of proteins

2026/08/072026/08/12

Study yields new insights into how proteins navigate crowded cell-like environments

How do proteins find their way through the dense crowd inside a cell? An international research team, including researchers from the University of Siegen, has investigated this question at the world’s largest X-ray laser – the European XFEL. The results of the measurements show that it is not just the viscosity of the environment that is decisive. The way the molecules influence one another also plays an important role – and can even lead to individual proteins initially moving faster than expected under certain conditions. The study has now been published in the prestigious journal Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences (PNAS).

“Conducting research at European XFEL was a fantastic opportunity and a wonderful experience. As proteins are very small – we’re talking in the nanometre range here – short-wavelength X-rays are well suited to studying them,” says Michelle Dargasz, lead author of the study and a PhD student working with Christian Gutt, Professor of Solid-State Physics at the University of Siegen.

Read more on the European XFEL website

Image: Co-authors Michelle Dargasz (right) and Nimmi Das Anthuparambil at the ‘Materials Imaging and Dynamics’ (MID) instrument at the European XFEL, where the experiments were carried out.

Credit: University of Siegen

SLAC researchers make movie of the first steps in a chemical reaction

2026/08/052026/08/06

Researchers have documented the ultrafast motion of electrons that drive the making and breaking of chemical bonds, including two processes never before captured on their natural timescales.

Key takeaways:

Researchers used SLAC’s X-ray laser to image early electron movement at attosecond timescales in what’s known as an “impulsively ionized” molecule.
They captured two processes never before seen in real time: Coster-Kronig decay and quantum electron coherence.
Experimental results contradicted leading computer simulations, forcing theorists to incorporate additional complexity for more accurate predictive models.

All chemistry starts with a push from electrons. In the early moments of a chemical reaction, it’s the movement of electrons that initiates the breaking of old chemical bonds and forging of new ones, transforming one molecule into another.

When an electron is removed from a molecule faster than the molecule can react – called “impulsive ionization” – the other electrons in the molecule enter excited quantum states that evolve on ultrafast timescales. Scientists have long sought to map the ultrasmall, ultrafast electronic motions behind chemical reactions on their natural timescales.

Now, researchers at the Department of Energy’s SLAC National Accelerator Laboratory have created a movie of early electron motion in an impulsively excited molecule. Each frame captures changes happening in mere attoseconds, just billionths of a billionth of a second. Their results, published in Nature Physics, map the early steps of a photochemical reaction, similar to the reactions that drive countless processes – from X-ray interactions in medical settings to cosmic ray collisions in the upper atmosphere. Their results reveal steps of these processes never before resolved in time.

Read more on the SLAC website