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08/04/2003
Go ahead given for extension to neutron facility in Oxfordshire
Work to harness environmentally friendly technology and develop medical applications received a boost today following a £100 million government award to the UK's leading neutron centre at the Rutherford Appleton Laboratory, near Didcot, Oxfordshire.
The package – announced by Science Minister Lord Sainsbury today – is one of the largest ever awards of government funding for a single science project, and will finance a new wing at the ISIS neutron laboratory.
It is hoped that the expansion will help scientists working on the next generation of environmentally friendly technologies, super-fast computers, data storage, and sensors, as well as pharmaceutical and medical solutions.
Lord Sainsbury, Science and Innovation Minister said: "The UK is a leader in the world in science and the development of new technologies, and it is vital that this continues, both for the benefits science and technology brings to the population, and the economic prosperity of this country.
"For this reason we are committed to sustained funding for scientific research and facilities. By 2005-06 the science budget will reach just short of £3 billion – more than double the figure in 1997-1998."
The current neutron facility, or 'target station', at ISIS is the most powerful neutron producer of its kind in the world, but it is fully developed and cannot expand to meet the capacity required by the scientific community. The second target station will offer unique equipment, and will maintain ISIS as a world- class facility for many years.
The £100.4 million funding announced today will be sufficient to complete the second target station itself. Additional funding will be needed for instrumentation, and a further announcement will be made on this in due course.
The government anticipates that some of the funding for instrumentation will be provided by partners from other countries, in exchange for access to the ISIS facilities.
The ISIS Facility provides powerful beams of neutrons that enable the structure and dynamics of condensed matter to be probed on a microscopic scale that ranges from the subatomic to the macromolecular.
(GMcG)
The package – announced by Science Minister Lord Sainsbury today – is one of the largest ever awards of government funding for a single science project, and will finance a new wing at the ISIS neutron laboratory.
It is hoped that the expansion will help scientists working on the next generation of environmentally friendly technologies, super-fast computers, data storage, and sensors, as well as pharmaceutical and medical solutions.
Lord Sainsbury, Science and Innovation Minister said: "The UK is a leader in the world in science and the development of new technologies, and it is vital that this continues, both for the benefits science and technology brings to the population, and the economic prosperity of this country.
"For this reason we are committed to sustained funding for scientific research and facilities. By 2005-06 the science budget will reach just short of £3 billion – more than double the figure in 1997-1998."
The current neutron facility, or 'target station', at ISIS is the most powerful neutron producer of its kind in the world, but it is fully developed and cannot expand to meet the capacity required by the scientific community. The second target station will offer unique equipment, and will maintain ISIS as a world- class facility for many years.
The £100.4 million funding announced today will be sufficient to complete the second target station itself. Additional funding will be needed for instrumentation, and a further announcement will be made on this in due course.
The government anticipates that some of the funding for instrumentation will be provided by partners from other countries, in exchange for access to the ISIS facilities.
The ISIS Facility provides powerful beams of neutrons that enable the structure and dynamics of condensed matter to be probed on a microscopic scale that ranges from the subatomic to the macromolecular.
(GMcG)
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