News

Are you interested in conducting your own postdoctoral research project, as a Marie Curie fellow, at the ILL - the world's leading facility in neutron science & technology?

Incorporating specifically tuned MOFs in a polymer membrane significantly enhances carbon dioxyde-methane separation performance, key in biogas purification. Neutron scattering measurements at ILL’s instrument IN1/Lagrange unveil the reasons why.

... or assessing ‘power naps’ for electrolysers | A recent study uses high resolution neutron imaging at the ILL to examine water dynamics in a carbon dioxide electrolysis cells - selected as research highlight in Nature Catalysis.

A novel porous material capable of separating deuterium from hydrogen at a temperature of 120 K (-153°C) has been introduced. This opens a pathway for sustainable industrial-scale isotope separation using existing liquefied natural gas (LNG) infrastructure.

In everyday life, we typically encounter water in one of three familiar states – solid, liquid or gas. But there are in fact many more phases, some of which – predicted to exist at high temperature and pressure – are so strange they’re referred to as exotic. State-of-the-art neutron spectrometers and sample environment infrastructures at the Institut Laue-Langevin (ILL) have enabled the first experimental observation of one of these exotic phases – plastic ice VII.

An international research team has used neutrons to study the nanometer-scale dynamics of water inside concrete. This is not only key to concrete strength, but also for the development of green concrete and environment-related applications.

Antimicrobial peptides (AMPs) are natural antibiotics which are very effective against resistant bacteria. Despite their interesting properties, AMPs remain difficult to use. A study just published marks a remarkable step forward in understanding how AMPs work. Taking full advantage of neutron and X-ray scattering, researchers obtained results that are both important and surprising.

A recently published study uses neutron and X-ray scattering to deepen our understanding of freeze-drying protein stabilisation processes, widely used in biopharmaceutical applications. The results obtained for a protein relevant for pharmaceutical applications are in stark contrast with those previously obtained for lysozyme, widely used as a model protein. This highlights the importance of protein selection in such studies.

A study now published in Nature Communications brings remarkable insights into the enigmatic behaviour of supercritical fluids, a hybrid state of matter occupying a unique space between liquids and gases, and arising in domains ranging from the pharmaceutical industry to planetary science. The obtained results are at the limit of current experimental possibilities and could only be obtained in a high-flux neutron source such as the ILL.

Using neutron spectroscopy data taken at ILL, researchers achieved a novel understanding of molecular movement at the nanoscale, providing new insights that may impact the design of future materials and technologies. The study has just been published in the Nature Portfolio open access journal Communications Chemistry – and is featured (as a banner) on the journal homepage.

The goal of this study was to complete the mapping of the dynamics of the well-known protein Hsp90 by studying the 5-500 ns timescale using a combination of state-of-the-art complementary techniques, and to take the first steps towards understanding how this timescale relates to the slower dynamics known to drive the protein’s functioning.

In an article published in ACS Macro Letters, a team of physicochemists describes a novel approach which uses neutron and light scattering to monitor in situ the self-assembly of amphiphilic block copolymers in near-equilibrium conditions. These results offer a wealth of possibilities for observing and better understanding the organisation of complex biological and synthetic macromolecules in aqu…