Setting the stage for advancing rheological testing at MAX IV and ESS - RheoMAXESS kick-off
Theme members pictured at the very first event of the RheMAXESS theme.
In January, the LINXS’s RheoMAXESS theme, Advanced Rheometry for Neutron and X-ray Science, kicked off its activities to start building a community around advancing rheological testing at MAX IV and ESS. Theme leader Roland Kádár emphasizes that a platform for mixing and matching competences in rheology and scattering techniques has been missing.
Roland Kádár is Professor of Rheology at Chalmers University of Technology and theme leader.
– Both rheology techniques and scattering techniques are not that widely used yet. Our theme enables us to create a group of highly skilled people with various backgrounds and perspectives. It is quite special, says Roland Kádár, Professor of Rheology at Chalmers University of Technology.
He is happy with the meeting, which he says was a great occasion to get to see almost everyone in the theme, including colleagues from near and far, as well as new people attending the kick-off. Attendance was high, with participants joining both in person and online. During the day, a lot of good ideas were brought to the table that will be further discussed by the core group.
– Having MAX IV and ESS placed so close to each other is a fantastic opportunity for research. One of our goals is to create optimal conditions for testing in-between the two facilities. If we start thinking and working towards this now, we will be in a good position to start doing experiments right when ESS opens.
Looking forward to setting the stage for the theme
The meeting highlighted what has been done in the field of rheological testing mainly with small angle X-ray and neutron scattering techniques at MAX IV and ESS. Now the work to gather insights, needs and ideas from the wider community and the new theme members starts. As the theme gathers researchers from industrial and material science, food, biotechnology, and computational science, as well as researchers from MAX IV and ESS, the breath of questions and problems will probably be both broad and many, notes Roland Kádár.
– By building a community on the topic, we can not only ‘spread the word’ about what has been done so far at MAX IV and ESS, and encourage new users of the techniques, but we can actually listen to the community and learn about what challenges several industries are facing. Could we then develop adequate platforms to address directly those challenges?
Based on the proposals received at the meeting, Roland Kádár and the core group will now start planning events and workshops. A more comprehensive workshop will be planned for the second half of 2025 and the theme will make a bid to host the Nordic Rheology Conference, for the first time jointly with the Mechanics of Time-dependent Materials Conference, in 2026 with a focus on scattering techniques.
– I am looking forward to the work ahead! We got off to a great start!