Daresbury Laboratory

Aerial view of Daresbury Laboratory
Established	1962 (1962)
Laboratory type	National scientific research laboratory
Field of research	Applied science Fundamental science
Director	Paul Vernon
Staff	300[1]
Location	Daresbury, England 53°20′35″N 2°38′26″W / 53.34306°N 2.64056°W / 53.34306; -2.64056
Operating agency	Science and Technology Facilities Council
Website	stfc.ukri.org/about-us/where-we-work/daresbury-laboratory/
Map
Location in Cheshire

Daresbury Laboratory is a scientific research laboratory based at Sci-Tech Daresbury campus near Daresbury in Halton, Cheshire, England. The laboratory began operations in 1962 and was officially opened on 16 June 1967 as the Daresbury Nuclear Physics Laboratory (DNPL) by the then Prime Minister of United Kingdom, Harold Wilson. It was the second national laboratory established by the British National Institute for Research in Nuclear Science, following the Rutherford High Energy Laboratory (now Rutherford Appleton Laboratory).^[2] It is operated by the Science and Technology Facilities Council, part of UK Research and Innovation. As of 2018, it employs around 300 staff,^[1] with Paul Vernon appointed as director in November 2020,^[3] taking over from Professor Susan Smith who had been director from 2012.

Description

Daresbury Laboratory carries out research in fields such as accelerator science, bio-medicine, physics, chemistry, materials, engineering and computational science. Its facilities are used by scientists and engineers, from both the university research community and industrial research base. The laboratory is based at Sci-Tech Daresbury.^[1]

Facilities and research

• Accelerator science, including the Cockcroft Institute which houses scientists from STFC, University of Manchester, University of Liverpool, University of Lancaster, and University of Strathclyde. Accelerator science facilities include:
  • VELA (Versatile Electron Linear Accelerator), an electron compact linear accelerator, based around an RF photocathode gun.^[4]
  • CLARA (Compact Linear Accelerator for Research Applications), an electron linear accelerator to be used for research in free-electron lasers.^[5]
  • FEBE (Full Energy Beam Exploitation), a beamline of CLARA designed for 2 GeV electron research.^[6]
• SuperSTEM, a national research facility for advanced electron microscopy. The facility belongs to EPSRC.^[7]
• The Hartree Centre, a high performance computing, data analytics and AI research facility.^[8]
• Scientific computing
• Nuclear physics
• Detector systems
• Superconducting Radio-Frequency Lab (SuRF Lab)^[9]
• Engineering Technology Centre^[10]
• Public engagement
• The University of Liverpool Virtual Engineering Centre^[11]
• PsiQuantum^[12]

Retired facilities

• NINA (Northern Institute's Nuclear Accelerator), an electron synchrotron; the first accelerator at the site.
• ALICE (Accelerators and Lasers In Combined Experiments), an electron accelerator previously known as ERLP (Energy Recovery Linac Prototype).^[13]
• EMMA (Electron Machine with Many Applications or Electron Model for Many Applications), a linear non-scaling FFAG accelerator.
• NSF (Nuclear Structure Facility), a tandem Van de Graaff accelerator housed in the tower.
• HPCx, a supercomputer (replaced by the UK national supercomputing service, HECToR, based in Edinburgh).^[14]
• Synchrotron Radiation Source (SRS)

Awards

In 2009 the laboratory was awarded the title of the "Most Outstanding Science Park" at the UK Science Parks Association.^[15]