For two days (7-8 March 2024), the SOLARIS Centre was transformed into the capital of the world of X-ray absorption spectroscopy (XAS), thanks to outstanding specialists who accepted an invitation from the Krakow synchrotron. The event was held in a hybrid mode and gathered about 300 participants who had the opportunity to participate in the symposium via the Zoom platform.

“Sylinda” is an international project, whose leader is SOLARIS, while the partners are the ALBA synchrotron (Spain) and two universities: Hochschule Niederrhein and the University of Bonn. The consortium’s activities aim to encourage industry to use the SOLARIS research infrastructure and increase its capabilities. The project goals also include expanding the group of scientists that visit SOLARIS.

The implementation of the SYLINDA project was also a steep learning curve for us. When we started the project three years ago, SOLARIS did not have any established cooperation paths with industrial partners. Today, we are organising a symposium where we sit around the same table with the best experts in industrial research not only from Europe but from almost all continents. At the same time, we are negotiating cooperation with the largest Polish technology companies, and our revenues from this activity reached half a million PLN last year. We are even more dynamic in the development of our project activity, where it is worth mentioning the coordination of one of the largest transnational access to research infrastructure projects currently underway in Europe, NEPHEWS. The Sylinda project has thus enabled us to achieve a level of international recognition of the SOLARIS brand that far exceeds our original expectations - said Michał Młynarczyk, coordinator of the SYLINDA project.

One of the main tasks in the project was to support the construction of the beamline which is being built by SOLARIS and Hochschule Niederrhein. The new beamline  ASTRA is currentlyused for X-ray absorption spectroscopy measurements and her supervisor Dr. Alexey Maximenko was one of the main organizers and performers of the event.

We got very positive feedback about the symposium, where we were able to listen to the presentations of recognized scientists in the field of X-ray absorption spectroscopy from European synchrotron radiation facilities organized in the LEAPS group, from the US synchrotron radiation facilities, the Thai synchrotron radiation facility and speakers from the leading groups developing the theoretical background for XAS theory and also some specialists for the successful collaboration of synchrotron radiation laboratories with industry. We are very glad about the interest of actual and potential users in attending the symposium. Each day of the symposium ended with a very lively and quite interesting panel discussion. We believe that the symposium will motivate further scientists to come to SOLARIS (and to the ASTRA beamline) to provide experiments and that this symposium also was a demonstration of the success of the SYLINDA project funded by the European Community (Contract No. 952148) - said Alexey Maximenko 

The symposium was a summary of the work of the entire team and an opportunity for a wider audience to get acquainted with the presentations of leaders of scientific groups from the world's best universities who conduct research using synchrotron radiation sources. The invited lecturers talked about how they use X-ray absorption spectroscopy in their daily research and familiarized the participants with the latest experimental achievements, as well as the possibilities of cooperation between science and industry.
During the poster session, 32 posters prepared by scientists who had the opportunity to conduct their experiments on the ASTRA beamline were presented. 
The main challenge of the symposium was to encourage participants to use this research technique and to show how it can be used at a higher level, which we hope has been achieved.

The "Sylinda" project  will last until June 2024.

Photo by: Joanna Kowalik