SAXS/SANS joint experiments

The establishment of this integrated platform allows to PSB members and associates as well as external users of the ESRF and ILL access to both the experimental facility for SAXS at the ESRF and facilities for small angle neutron scattering (SANS) at the Institut Laue-Langevin (ILL).

For those ILL proposals which have signalled a wish for ESRF SAXS time and which are awarded beam time by the ILL they can now apply for beamtime within the ESRF SANSAXS BAG. Usually 1 shift of SAXS beamtime is allocated acoordingly (close to) with allocated SANS time.

First users using both facilities during one trip have performed their experiments in the autumn 2010 and many other groups profited of this opportunity since than.

SANS uses the dramatic difference in the interaction of neutrons with hydrogen atoms ¹H and deuterons ²H and allows contrast variation studies on 2 (and more) component systems (as ribosome, DNA-protein complexes, ...) and is comlementary to SAXS.

For further details see SAXS/SANS PSB platform web page

D₂O waste handling

• a dedicated 10L waste container (below experimetal table at the level ofSC) has to be used (marked with D₂O label) instaed a 'normal ' one;
• at the end of experiment (or when users stop to investigate samples containing deuterium) this container has to be removed and waste with D₂O put into a special container labelled with the experiment name delivered by safety prior to such experiment;
• users have to take it with them out of the ESRF;
• put back the "normal" 10L container;
• never mix "normal" waste with waste containing deuterium.