The Hard X-ray Science Initiative (HXRS) will host a Town Hall Meeting to solicit ideas for, and inform the direction of, the HXRS strategy. The meeting will be held in Building 401, Rm. A1100 on Wednesday February 28, 2018, at 1:00 pm.

The centerpiece of this initiative is the science and engineering that is enabled by the Advanced Photon Source, and that will be revolutionized by the coming APS Upgrade (APS-U). The APS is a world-leading hard x-ray synchrotron radiation facility at Argonne National Laboratory with 68 independently operating beamlines run either by the APS or partners, each with very specific capabilities in spectroscopy, diffraction, and imaging. The development and use of these beamlines is a core strength of Argonne, providing a cross-cutting link to many current and proposed science and technology programs at the Lab. Hence, there are already numerous groups at Argonne that are involved with the APS.

However, an even larger number of research activities and groups could benefit from such capabilities. Thus, we have organized this town hall meeting for Argonne researchers to highlight opportunities utilizing hard x-rays in the biological, physical, and environmental sciences, along with engineering and energy technologies, and to showcase future possibilities with an upgraded APS. The development of novel experimental and computational methods that enable new science applications at APS and APS-U that otherwise would not be possible, is also of significant interest.

This meeting will include a brief introduction to HXRS, followed by presentations from APS scientists who will summarize present and future capabilities. This will be followed by an open session for brief presentations outlining ideas for scientific directions under HXRS.
Input from this meeting will inform the HXRS LDRD portfolio as well as shape the 2018 Laboratory Strategic Plan. Participation from across the Laboratory is essential to create a balanced, representative strategy.

Call for presenters

All interested members of the Argonne community are invited to attend and/or to present. We particularly encourage contributions from early career staff. Each presentation should consist of no more than two slides that identify the opportunity and outline Argonne's approach. While an important longer-term investment is the development of novel concepts for future generations of hard x-ray sources at Argonne, this topic will be covered in separate future meetings.

Submissions will be made available on Box.

Please email submissions to Tracy Thomas at tthomas@aps.anl.gov by 5:00 p.m. on Monday, February 26.