This month’s newsletter highlights the work that took place this summer, particularly the precise coordination and communication needed to complete a year’s worth of construction in only four months’ time.

We highlight new funding from the Office of Naval Research. Our staff scientists, Kelly Nygren and Kate Shanks, have started a project that will develop strategies for optimizing data collection, processing, and analysis. We feature a highlight from FAST, in which researchers offer new insights into dwell fatigue in titanium. A new robotic arm is also being commissioned at our Structural Materials Beamline, enabling new state-of-the art experiments.

Although things are going great, there are very challenging times ahead. The oversubscription rate for our general user program jumped from about 2 to about 4 this fall and is expected to increase further as the APS-U shutdown begins in the spring of 2023 and energy shortages challenge operations at European facilities. Worldwide, competition for X-ray beamtime at high-energy synchrotron facilities is going to intensify for at least the next year. Locally, although some additional funding came through, NSF was not able to fully fund CHEXS operations in the current grant year (ending March 31^st, 2023). The result is that the FAST and HP-BIO beamlines will be available for 100 rather than 125 user days. These figures are reflected in the fall 2022 and winter 2023 beamtime allocations. In the next grant year (the year beginning April 1^st, 2023), the FAST and HP-BIO beamlines are funded for 55 user days. I am hopeful that, if Congress passes a budget, NSF may be able to provide some additional funding for user operations. Stay tuned.

Joel Brock, Director, CHESS (email Joel)

Researchers have returned to CHESS this month after a long summer of construction and upgrades to the facility. CHESS shuts down yearly to allow for machine upgrades and to beat the heat and humidity of summer, but starting back up is never as easy as "flipping on a switch."

The high precision of HEDM measurements at FAST offer new insight into the microscopic processes that cause dwell fatigue, pointing toward new alloying strategies for mitigation.

A new Kuka Robotic arm is the most recent addition in a series of instrumentation upgrades at SMB. With six independent axes, it offers flexibility in positioning objects in any arbitrary locations within a defined boundary. Located inside the experimental hutch, the new robotic arm allows SMB researchers to perform experiments that were not previously possible.

Driven by the insights from 3D data acquired in real-time, the creation of new characterization methods for structural metals has seen explosive growth over the past two decades. Using high-energy X-rays and new generations of detectors, like those available at CHESS, scientists can now extract higher-resolution information over larger volumes of material at rates that were only a dream several years ago.