What is a synchrotron ?

A synchrotron is an accelerator of electrons. The electrons are maintained in a circular ring by magnetic field and produce X-Rays tangentially to their trajectory.

These X-Rays are used by sereval beamlines located around the storage ring to analyse samples for many domains of interest:

• Biology
• Chemistry
• Earth science
• Environment
• Industry
• Materials
• Medicine
• Physics

You will find on the Daresbury Laboratory pages a presentation of what a synchrotron is.

See also the ESRF pages for a interesting synchrotron's description including a virtual tour.

How does it work ?

Electrons emitted by an electron gun are first accelerated in a linear accelerator (linac) and then transmitted to a circular accelerator (booster synchrotron) where they are accelerated to reach an high energy level.

These high-energy electrons are then injected into a circular storage ring where they circulate in a vacuum environment, at a constant energy, for many hours.

The electrons are accelerated and deviated in the storage ring by different magnetic components:

• Bending magnets: they allow to deviate the electrons by several degrees. This deviation results in an tangential emition of X-Rays by the electrons.
• Ondulators: they force the electrons to follow an undulating trajectory. The X-Rays emitted by this ondulation will contribute to generate a much more intense beam of light than that generated by the bending magnets.
• Focusing magnets: they allow to keep the electron beam small and well-defined. More small and well-defined the electron beam will be, more bright the X-Rays. These magnets are placed in the straight sections of the storage ring.

The X-Rays emitted by the electrons are directed towards the beamlines situated tangentially to the storage ring in the experimental hall.

Each beamline is designed for use with a specific technique or for a specific type of research.

Experiments run throughout the day and night.