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SPring-8 Users Community (SPRUC)

Research Group:

Practical Application Research Group

Research program officer:
  Takahara Masatoshi / Osaka University
Contact:
  Wakabayashi Yusuke
  Institute for Study of the Earth's Interior, Okayama University
  Telephone / Fax: +81-6-6850-6456
  wakabayashi(at) mp.es.osaka-u.ac.jp

Outline and goals:

The basic policy of organizing the Practical Application Research Group (hereafter, the Group) is to clarify the background science of technological bottlenecks that have not been clarified from a practical viewpoint and to address these bottlenecks to facilitate the development of practical materials. To this end, the Group aims to fully utilize state-of-the-art synchrotron radiation facilities. As concrete activities, the Group aims to form a new user community by inviting new users while intensively addressing the following five research themes for the time being. The results obtained through the activities are discussed among the members of the Group to select an appropriate research theme as a proposal to be applied to the Epoch-Making Initiatives Project using a SPring-8 public beamline.

Candidate research themes to be intensively addressed:

  1. Clarification of dynamic properties of solid/liquid interfaces on the picosecond to femtosecond time scale that covers both microscopic to macroscopic phenomena, such as solvation and ion dynamics, to improve the performance of rechargeable batteries and fuel cells
  2. Clarification of the structure and reaction dynamics of catalysts to enable energy-saving and resource-saving manufacturing
  3. Clarification of the relationship between the structure and properties of organic thin-film interfaces to improve the performance of materials used in organic electronics
  4. Clarification of the properties of solid/liquid interfaces consisting of inorganic materials to realize artificial photosynthesis
  5. Research on trace elements contained in food for the safety of food and a secure life
The above themes are tentative and new themes will be added if they comply with the policy explained above.

Activity history and future plan of the Group:

September 7, 2015 :

The first preparatory meeting of the Group was held at the Center for Promotion of Advanced Interdisciplinary Research, School of Engineering Science, Osaka University.

March, 2016 :

A kickoff meeting is planned to be held.

Participation to the Group:

The Group will be organized by core members in fiscal 2015 and a call for the participation of new members under the following conditions will go out in fiscal 2016 or later.

  1. Each member shall make a presentation on one's own research at meetings, workshops, etc. (participation only for information gathering is unacceptable).
  2. All the information gained at meetings, workshops, etc. shall be confidential. All the participants will be required to sign a nondisclosure agreement.
  3. The activity of the Group will be reported to the members of the SPring-8 Users Community (SPRUC) at an appropriate time.