91ÊÓƵ

91ÊÓƵ has approved the large-scale project, "Structural studies and radiation testing of promising materials using synchrotron radiation and neutrons". This project will integrate interdisciplinary scientific research into the atomic structure of inorganic, organic, and biological objects with diagnostics of materials and products using X-ray and synchrotron radiation and neutron beams. The project will also prepare the specialists necessary for the Siberian Ring Photon Source (SKIF) to realize its potential to provide great opportunities for Novosibirsk scientists.

Sergey Tsybulya, Project Head and Head of the Section Physical Methods for Studying Solids, talked about the project,

SKIF is a specialized instrument to generate radiation and send it out to experimental stations. Researchers should be able to use it which means to establish goals, understand and develop methods to achieve them, and to predict and interpret results. We need specialists who can plan and conduct experiments, use the software, and decipher the results. In three years, SKIF will start its operations and scientists must deal with the basic question, how wide will the circle of its potential users be? Our project will train specialists from various fields who are ready to take advantage of the unique opportunities SKIF will provide.  This includes physics, chemistry, biology, geology, and materials science.

The project is supported by the Priority 2030 Program and is being conducted in close cooperation with Novosibirsk Scientific Center Institutes and the CCU SKIF. These institutions have signed an agreement with NSU for scientific cooperation and training in the field of synchrotron and neutron research.

Tsybulya explained that earlier, Novosibirsk researchers had to go abroad or to Moscow to conduct this type of interdisciplinary work. The SKIF launch will greatly simplify the process for researchers from Novosibirsk and neighboring regions who do not have the laboratory tools to support their work and require synchrotron methods of analysis. The project will also attract students and young scientists who are just starting their career paths in science.

Currently, Novosibirsk scientists, together with NSU students and postgraduates, are:

• developing lithium-neuron capture therapy and methods of boron visualization during boron neutron capture therapy;
• conducting radiation testing of promising materials;
• researching structural transformations in nanocrystalline oxide and metal oxide systems that can become a new generation of catalysts or their carriers for heterogeneous catalysis;
• analyzing the spatial structures of DNA repair enzymes, etc.

Tsybulya added.