MLZ / LLB Workshop 2025 in Garching

25 Nov 2025, 13:00 → 27 Nov 2025, 14:40 Europe/Berlin

Institute for Advanced Study (IAS)

Arnaud Desmedt (CNRS - ISM Univ. Bordeaux), Christian Pfleiderer (TUM FRM II), Grégory Chaboussant (LLB (CNRS-CEA))

MLZ / LLB Workshop 2025 in Garching

Institute for Advanced Study on TUM Campus Garching (Photo: Andreas Battenberg / TUM)

From 25 to 27 November 2025 scientists from the Laboratoire Léon Brillouin (LLB) and the Heinz Maier-Leibnitz Zentrum (MLZ) will meet at the Institute for Advanced Study (IAS) located on the TUM Campus in Garching near Munich. The meeting follows the tradition of several regular workshops in the past years which already fostered the bonds between French and German neutron scientists.

The LLB is supported jointly by the Commissariat à l'Energie Atomique (CEA) and the Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique (CNRS). Its aim is to carry out research on the structure and dynamics of condensed matter using neutrons at various facilities. It is situated in the CEA/Saclay research centre.

The MLZ represents the cooperation between the Technische Universität München (TUM) and two research centres of the Helmholtz Association, namely Forschungszentrum Jülich and Helmholtz-Zentrum Hereon to exploit the scientific use of the Forschungs-Neutronenquelle Heinz Maier-Leibnitz in Garching near Munich. 

The 2025 French-German WE-Heraeus Seminar on “Neutron Sources and Neutron Instrumentation: a Complex Ecosystem” will summarize and discuss the advantages and disadvantages of different neutron sources, the optimal instrumentation tailored for these sources, and the required infrastructure for their operation, in the light of present-day scientific and technological grand challenges. As both the development and operational requirements are becoming increasingly complex, fostering intellectual ownership and ensuring the efficient use of neutron scattering facilities has become a pressing challenge, also addressed at the seminar.

The directors of LLB and MLZ are looking forward to your participation! 

                       

On behalf of LLB                       On behalf of MLZ                            

Arnaud Desmedt                       Martin Müller
Grégory Chaboussant              Christian Pfleiderer
                                                     Stephan Förster           

 

Tuesday 25 November

Introductions

Conveners: Arnaud Desmedt, Christian Pfleiderer (TUM FRM II)

1 Introduction by Directors of MLZ and LLB

Speakers: Arnaud Desmedt (LLB), Christian Pfleiderer (TUM FRM II)

2 Presentation of the IRP: past, present, future

Speaker: Grégory Chaboussant

3 Presentation of 2FDN (on Visio)

Speaker: Fabrice Cousin

Science Talks

4 AI/magnetic excitations

Speaker: Alessandra Cappati (CEA)

5 AI/imaging

Speaker: Abdel Rahman Al-Falou

6 AI/SANS

Speaker: Stefan Häusler (JCNS, Forschungszentrum Jülich GmbH)

16:30 Coffee Break

ESS instruments: progress/perspectives => first science

7 DREAM

Speaker: Florence Porcher (European spallation Source)

8 SKADI

Speaker: Sebastian Jaksch (Physicist)

9 CSPEC

Speaker: Stéphane Longeville (CEA-LLB)

10 MAGiC – polarized diffractometer for magnetism

MAGiC is designed as a universal and flexible neutron diffractometer with all necessary capabilities for any kind of polarization analysis. The instrument is dedicated and optimized for magnetic scattering and is intended to meet most practical needs for magnetic elastic scattering experiments, except for small-angle scattering case.

Speaker: Denis Vasiukov (European Spallation Source ERIC)

19:30 Dinner

Wednesday 26 November

New facilities, new instruments I

11 ICONE, TDR results

Icone project is at the end of its TDR phase. The design, the estimated performances and the construction plan are presented.

Speaker: Nicolas Pichoff (CEA/IRAMIS - France)

12 HBS

Speaker: Joerg Voigt (Forschungszentrum Jülich)

13 IMAGING

Speaker: Tobias Juenger (MLZ)

14 FANTASTIC, an indirect geometry TOF spectrometer designed for the ICONE neutron source

ICONE (Innovative COmpact NEutrons facility) is a HiCANS-type source designed to provide a cutting-edge instrument suite for the French scientific community by 2035. FANTASTIC is a BIFROST-like spectrometer, specifically developed and optimized for this source. A digital twin of FANTASTIC has been created using McStas to predict its performance and conduct virtual experiments. In this presentation, we will showcase the design of FANTASTIC and present extensive McStas simulations, including guide system optimization, resolution calculations, virtual experiments, and comparisons with experimental measurements.

Speaker: Kyriakos Karyos (CEA/LLB)

10:20 Coffee Break

Round Table

13:00 Lunch

New facilities, new instruments II

15 PGAA FRM2/LLB

Speaker: Edis Hrustanbegovic (FRM2)

16 MUSHROOM

Speaker: Robert Georgii

17 TOPAS

TOPAS is a thermal neutron time-of-flight spectrometer with polarization analysis option, being constructed and commissioned in the MLZ Guide Hall East. We present recent developments as well as future plans for hot commissioning, science, sample environment and user operation.

Speaker: Michal Stekiel (Juelich Centre for Neutron Science)

18 LADIFF: Relocation and upgrade of the cold triple axis spectrometer FLEXX at MLZ, Munich

The cold triple-axis spectrometer (TAS) FLEXX at HZB was a well-designed and upgraded instrument. There is a strong wish that this excellent instrument should be preserved for the community. One attractive option in the present instrumentation suite of MLZ, is the possibility to combine high magnetic fields together with cold TAS as well as the Larmor-diffraction technique and cold neutron resonant spin echo.

Speaker: Markos Skoulatos (TUM)

15:30 Coffee

New facilities, new instruments III

19 SAM and SHARPER, the outstation of the Laboratoire Léon Brillouin at the Institute Laue-Langevin

In this talk, I will be presenting the two instruments managed by the LLB at the ILL, SAM and SHARPER, a small-angle neutron diffractometer and a cold time-of-flight spectrometer, respectively. The presentation includes a brief history of their installation, an overview of their current capabilities, some examples from recent users' experiments, and the planned upgrades for the near future.

Speaker: Lorenzo Metilli (Laboratoire Léon Brillouin)

20 Pulsed Magnetic Fields for Neutron Diffraction on IN22

Over the past two decades, there have been significant advancements in neutron diffraction performed in high magnetic fields, with experiments now pushing boundaries to fields as high as 40 T. This progress stems from the development of specialized pulsed field devices, using either short or long duration pulsed magnets [1, 2].
In this presentation, I will provide an overview of the 2 K/40-T pulsed field-cryomagnet collaboratively developed by LNCMI-Toulouse, ILL-Grenoble, and CEA-Grenoble. This magnet has been in successful operation since 2015, serving the community on the CRG-CEA spectrometer IN22 at the ILL.
References
[1] S. Yoshii et al., Phys. Rev. Lett. 103 (2009) 077203.
[2] F. Duc et al., Rev. Sci. Instrum. 89 (2018) 053905.

Speaker: Fabienne Duc (Laboratoire National des Champs Magnétiques Intenses - CNRS)

21 nGI on electrical steels

Speaker: Michael Schulz

19:30 Dinner

Thursday 27 November

Science Talks

22 PND on molecular magnets

Speaker: Pikesh Pal (ülich Centre for Neutron Science JCNS at MLZ)

23 TOF SANS on nanostructures

Speaker: Milos Fejercak (Institute Laue-Langevin)

24 SANS/SESANS on topological magnets

Speaker: Denis Mettus (Technische Universität München)

10:30 Coffee

Science Talks

25 Kinetic regimes of hydrogen absorption in metallic thin films

Resonant enhanced neutron reflectometry combined with x-ray reflectivity, diffraction, and electrical transport gives time-sensitive, detailed information on the processes of hydrogen absorption at material interfaces. Here, we will show the capabilities of the combination of these methods in Nb and Pd, two well-known hydrogen absorbers with widely different responses to hydrogenation.

Speaker: Laura Guasco

26 Polarized neutrons revealed altermagnetism in MnF2

Altermagnets (AMs) are collinear antiferromagnets in which momentum-dependent spin splitting can occur even without spin-orbit coupling. Here, we present polarized inelastic neutron scattering results on MnF2, a material long regarded as a prototypical antiferromagnet. We show that the magnon bands actually possess different chiralities, hence establishing this material as an altermagnetic insulator.

Speaker: Quentin Faure (LLB - CEA-Saclay)

27 Anionic boron clusters

Speaker: Ioanna Chazapi (ICSM)

12:00 Lunch

Science Talks

28 Dimethyl Carbonate: A Tour Through Large Scale Facility Methods

Dimethyl carbonate (DMC) is an important component found in the charge-mediating liquid electrolyte of commercial Lithium-ion batteries. This contribution presents our efforts to characterise the short- and long-range order in DMC using different complementary synchrotron and neutron techniques.

Speaker: Lea Westphal (TUM/MLZ)

29 Bio/AI

Speaker: Alexandros Koutsioumpas (JCNS)

Conclusion and outcome