Periodic Reporting for period 1 - NEPHEWS (NEutrons and PHotons Elevating Worldwide Science (NEPHEWS))
Reporting period: 2024-01-01 to 2025-06-30
NEutrons and PHotons Elevating Worldwide Science - NEPHEWS is a project that integrate together two European Users Organizations, ESUO and ENSA, with two largest and most advanced consortia LEAPS and LENS. The idea of this project is to develop a new way of cooperation, where neutron facilities works side by side with LEAPS Infrastructures. Additionally, NEPHEWS will give a voice to users through a pioneering User-to-User approach, providing ESUO and ENSA with a leading role in the development of the project.
As of January 1, 2024, a new project "NEPHEWS - Neutrons and Photons Elevating Worldwide Science" has emerged on the European map, led by NCPS SOLARIS. This initiative holds significant importance within the Horizon Europe Program, marked by Polish coordination, broad partnership and unique substantive scope.
The project primary objective is to grant researchers access to cutting-edge European photon source (LEAPS - League of European Accelerator-based Photon Sources) and neutron source (LENS- League of advanced European Neutron Sources). This access aims to enhance collaboration with User communities in supported countries and foster research excellence.
Close cooperation with ESUO (European Synchrotron and Free Electron Laser User Organization) and ENSA (European Neutron Scattering Association) representing over 40 thousand Users, underscore the project's commitment to meeting the specific needs of these communities throughout their scientific career development. Geographically, the NEPHEWS project prioritizes European developing countries (Widening countries), Ukraine, and Africa.
The project employs a bottom-up, User-centered approach to create an integrated landscape of photon and neutron research infrastructures and their European User communities. This approach is unprecedented in the scale of European collaborative networks.
The objectives of the NEPHEWS project are the following:
• Objective 1 Curiosity driven Trans-National Access provision: Our primary objective is to provide access for curiosity-driven science for users of the open SR, FEL and advanced N facilities via TNA funding, where such access is an activity with strong European added value that is not usually supported by national funding bodies. This will in total provide 38,290 hours of TNA funded access to the NEPHEWS consortium open RI for 902 researchers to pursue frontier knowledge science, spanning all curiosity-driven areas, and provided with the necessary financial and logistic access support;
• Objective 2. Lowering of barriers to access: To communicate and educate about access mechanisms, novel research opportunities, support structures and benefits of these world-class facilities to new users, ESRs, in wider user communities, nationally, regionally or in scientific fields/disciplines not normally using these RI;
• Objective 3: Twinning for scientific sustainability: To twin new users, new user groups, new ESRs, scientists new to these techniques or established non-expert users with hosting expert user groups to participate in twinning experiments at these RIs. In total 135 new users will be twinned with willing expert hosting user groups, will participate in experiments of the expert group, in-person on-site embedded with their hosts. This will foster collaboration, rapidly bring these new users up to speed in their knowledge, substantially decreasing their barrier to entry in independently accessing these RI, and in the preparation and submission of their own high-quality scientific proposals to RI; now a seed for future user groups and twinning hosts;
• Objective 4: Advocate for Sustainable National Access Mechanisms: To advocate for national policy initiatives that will increase access, or lower financial barriers to access, for users within multiple countries across Europe. A particular emphasis will be firstly in those targeted Widening countries or countries without facilities and their NFAs to at a minimum fund the costs of the extra-national access for their national users of LEAPS and LENS RI. NFAs in these targeted countries are engaged with throughout.
The NEPHEWS project aims to integrate groundbreaking research infrastructure landscape, fostering collaboration and excellence in photon and neutron research across Europe.
As of January 1, 2024, a new project "NEPHEWS - Neutrons and Photons Elevating Worldwide Science" has emerged on the European map, led by NCPS SOLARIS. This initiative holds significant importance within the Horizon Europe Program, marked by Polish coordination, broad partnership and unique substantive scope.
The project primary objective is to grant researchers access to cutting-edge European photon source (LEAPS - League of European Accelerator-based Photon Sources) and neutron source (LENS- League of advanced European Neutron Sources). This access aims to enhance collaboration with User communities in supported countries and foster research excellence.
Close cooperation with ESUO (European Synchrotron and Free Electron Laser User Organization) and ENSA (European Neutron Scattering Association) representing over 40 thousand Users, underscore the project's commitment to meeting the specific needs of these communities throughout their scientific career development. Geographically, the NEPHEWS project prioritizes European developing countries (Widening countries), Ukraine, and Africa.
The project employs a bottom-up, User-centered approach to create an integrated landscape of photon and neutron research infrastructures and their European User communities. This approach is unprecedented in the scale of European collaborative networks.
The objectives of the NEPHEWS project are the following:
• Objective 1 Curiosity driven Trans-National Access provision: Our primary objective is to provide access for curiosity-driven science for users of the open SR, FEL and advanced N facilities via TNA funding, where such access is an activity with strong European added value that is not usually supported by national funding bodies. This will in total provide 38,290 hours of TNA funded access to the NEPHEWS consortium open RI for 902 researchers to pursue frontier knowledge science, spanning all curiosity-driven areas, and provided with the necessary financial and logistic access support;
• Objective 2. Lowering of barriers to access: To communicate and educate about access mechanisms, novel research opportunities, support structures and benefits of these world-class facilities to new users, ESRs, in wider user communities, nationally, regionally or in scientific fields/disciplines not normally using these RI;
• Objective 3: Twinning for scientific sustainability: To twin new users, new user groups, new ESRs, scientists new to these techniques or established non-expert users with hosting expert user groups to participate in twinning experiments at these RIs. In total 135 new users will be twinned with willing expert hosting user groups, will participate in experiments of the expert group, in-person on-site embedded with their hosts. This will foster collaboration, rapidly bring these new users up to speed in their knowledge, substantially decreasing their barrier to entry in independently accessing these RI, and in the preparation and submission of their own high-quality scientific proposals to RI; now a seed for future user groups and twinning hosts;
• Objective 4: Advocate for Sustainable National Access Mechanisms: To advocate for national policy initiatives that will increase access, or lower financial barriers to access, for users within multiple countries across Europe. A particular emphasis will be firstly in those targeted Widening countries or countries without facilities and their NFAs to at a minimum fund the costs of the extra-national access for their national users of LEAPS and LENS RI. NFAs in these targeted countries are engaged with throughout.
The NEPHEWS project aims to integrate groundbreaking research infrastructure landscape, fostering collaboration and excellence in photon and neutron research across Europe.
These tasks will be executed through extensive promotional and informational activities targeting the project's stakeholders and specific user groups.
Over the 36-month project duration:
• Experienced Users will be allocated more than 38,000 hours of beamtime to conduct experiments on project-provided beamlines.
• New Users in the User-twinning program can join experienced User groups, engaging in experiments to deepen their knowledge of measurement techniques and facility usage in their scientific careers.
• Young scientists can undertake week-long internships at large-scale research centers affiliated with the project, gaining essential scientific and research knowledge.
• Training courses will be developed for all young scientists, covering a range of topics. Day 1 focuses on experiment possibilities, while Day 2 addresses procedures for infrastructure access, including guidelines for preparing successful beamtime applications.
• Scientists from selected African countries will have access to training opportunities, including attendance at the HERCULES school to enhance their scientific knowledge.
• Cooperation will be established with ministries and national science and research funding agencies from widening countries to raise awareness of research funding importance and foster cooperation with User communities.
Over the 36-month project duration:
• Experienced Users will be allocated more than 38,000 hours of beamtime to conduct experiments on project-provided beamlines.
• New Users in the User-twinning program can join experienced User groups, engaging in experiments to deepen their knowledge of measurement techniques and facility usage in their scientific careers.
• Young scientists can undertake week-long internships at large-scale research centers affiliated with the project, gaining essential scientific and research knowledge.
• Training courses will be developed for all young scientists, covering a range of topics. Day 1 focuses on experiment possibilities, while Day 2 addresses procedures for infrastructure access, including guidelines for preparing successful beamtime applications.
• Scientists from selected African countries will have access to training opportunities, including attendance at the HERCULES school to enhance their scientific knowledge.
• Cooperation will be established with ministries and national science and research funding agencies from widening countries to raise awareness of research funding importance and foster cooperation with User communities.
Within the NEPHEWS framework, new cross communication channels between the national user communities and the RIs will focus on the impact of new TNA user access. Education and training for next generation users in relevant scientific techniques, in cross disciplinary applications and synergy of technical approaches, and in proposal writing will increase success rates in obtaining beamtime at RIs. The twinning programme, bringing experienced groups together with new or inexperienced scientists and high-level support, at the RIs will reduce hurdles to writing a good proposal, create a
supportive environment for experiments, analysing data and publishing results and foster collaborations. Further these twinned users will seed future activity in their communities allowing these to grow, as in the targeted Widening countries. Starting with previous user statistics, the NEPHEWS can together with the targeted countries national communities, initiate a dialogue with National Funding Agencies at the beginning of NEPHEWS. This dialogue will be revisited and updated as user metrics are completed, and our policy white paper and roadmap are prepared.
supportive environment for experiments, analysing data and publishing results and foster collaborations. Further these twinned users will seed future activity in their communities allowing these to grow, as in the targeted Widening countries. Starting with previous user statistics, the NEPHEWS can together with the targeted countries national communities, initiate a dialogue with National Funding Agencies at the beginning of NEPHEWS. This dialogue will be revisited and updated as user metrics are completed, and our policy white paper and roadmap are prepared.