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The prospect of France and the United Kingdom abandoning their planned national second-generation synchrotrons — SOLEIL and DIAMOND respectively — in favour of jointly constructing a single machine (see Nature 381, 100; 100; 1996) has been definitively dropped.

David Norman, who took over this week as head of synchrotron radiation at the Daresbury laboratories in Cheshire, says that it has been agreed that the size of the user communities in each country justifies each building its own machine.

“Synchrotron radiation is now just part of the everyday tool kit of many scientists, and is no longer just the frontier research tool for the few,” says Norman, who took over from Ian Munroe, who has retired.

Instead, Britain, France and Switzerland — which plans to build the 2.1-GeV Swiss Light Source — will coordinate the construction of their respective synchrotrons to reduce costs and overlap. A tripartite agreement setting out the terms of such collaboration is about to be signed.

This will identify areas for cooperation, such as the joint design of components, the standardization of materials and procedures, and bulk purchasing. The agreement also addresses concern that the simultaneous construction of three large synchrotrons could outstrip the capacity of European industry.

The deal will grant researchers reciprocal access to one another's beamlines. The 3-GeV DIAMOND machine produces harder X-rays than the Swiss and French machines, and is more suited to studying biological structures. Softer X-rays are better for determining electronic structure and spectroscopy.

The French government is expected to approve SOLEIL soon (see above), and the Swiss project is in the final stages of approval. John Cadogan, director-general of the UK research councils, this week submitted the full case for DIAMOND to the councils for comment.