Scientists Pay Tribute to International Success Story

On January 19th scientists gathered to celebrate fifty years of world leading research carried out at a major neutron source facility led by a partnership of the UK, France and Germany.

Based in Grenoble, France the Institut Laue-Langevin (ILL) has effectively provided users with a ‘giant microscope’, for the study of materials and biological structures. The facility has welcomed scientists from 45 different countries, who have between them conducted 40,000 experiments in fields ranging from engineering to Earth science, leading to more than 20,000 published papers.

One of the winners of the 2016 Nobel Prize for Physics, Duncan Haldane, whose work may help pave the way for quantum computers and other technologies, worked as a post-doctoral researcher in the ILL's theory group in the late 1970s and early 1980s.

The UK became one of three Associate Members of the ILL in 1973, joining partners France and Germany. Universities and Science Minister Jo Johnson said: “For the past four decades, the UK has played a key role in the research conducted at the ILL, helping improve our understanding of neutrons and materials and how we can use this knowledge to develop new fuels and radiotherapy techniques.

“While celebrating the past 50 years, we look forward to continuing our collaboration with our European partners. Our upcoming Industrial Strategy has science and innovation at its core and will ensure the UK is best placed to continue playing a leading role in scientific breakthroughs that improve millions of lives.”

More than a quarter of the total experiments at the ILL have been conducted by UK researchers. Through the Science and Technology Facilities Council, the UK continues to fund the ILL with an annual subscription that gives UK scientists access to the facility.

The UK Ambassador to France, Rt Hon Lord Llewellyn OBE said: “The UK remains committed to international science and collaboration with its European partners. This commitment will continue now and in to the future, and we look forward to the world benefitting from many more years of cutting-edge research emanating from the ILL”.

In November, the Prime Minister committed an additional £2 billion per year for UK research and innovation by 2020/21.

STFC’s Chief Executive Brian Bowsher who himself spent time at the facility in the 1980s was part of the UK delegation in Grenoble today. He said:

“Alongside those of our partner countries, we can be immensely proud of the UK’s achievements at the ILL. From the sharing of our neutron scattering expertise in its early days to the pioneering work carried out by many, many scientists from all over the world since, it is wonderful to see the ILL continue to thrive since the early days when I was there. So much has changed, and yet the spirit, the team work, the international collaboration remains just as it was”.

Professor Bill Stirling is one of the UK scientists to have the longest standing relationships with the ILL. He took a job as an instrument scientist at the facility in Grenoble shortly after the UK joined the ILL, designing and building instruments, some of which are still in operation today.

He later went on to sit on a number of ILL advisory committees, before being appointed Director General of the European Synchrotron Radiation Facility (ESRF) in 2001 and later, the Director of ILL.

The UK delegation at the anniversary celebrations also included Grahame Blair, STFC’s Executive Director of Programmes, Professor Andrew Harrison, a former Director of the ILL and the current Director of the UK’s synchrotron, Diamond Light Source, as well as Dr Robert McGreevy, Director of the UK’s ISIS neutron source and STFC’s Executive Director of National labs, Dr Andrew Taylor.