A NATO Advanced Research Workshop on "Brilliant Light Facilities and
Research in Life and Material Sciences" was held from July 17 to July
21, 2006. The workshop was hosted by the Center for the Advancement of
Natural Discoveries using Light Emission, Yerevan - the newly
established institute in Armenia with the aim to create a synchrotron
radiation facility, CANDLE, as an international laboratory for advanced
research in life and material sciences. About 50 researchers from NATO,
partner countries and Armenia gathered at Yerevan to discuss modern
trends in developments of advanced light sources with high spectral
brilliance and applications in basic and applied research in a wide
range of fields. Research with high brilliant photon beams are used, for
example for practical applications in pharmacy, electronics and
nanotechnology. Such practical relevance promoted the design and
construction of now more than 50 such facilities worldwide. Overview and
specialized talks on the status and highlights of newly constructed
light sources (ALBA, SPEAR3, European XFEL Facility, Siberian
Synchrotron Radiation Center, CANDLE), on instrumentation and
development of experimental techniques, and frontier research in life
and material sciences using synchrotron radiation have been presented.
More than 60% of the program was devoted to application of synchrotron
radiation in biophysics, biochemistry, biomedicine, material and
environmental investigations. The workshop brought together scientists
from a wide spectrum of research fields emphasizing the wide application
and demand of synchrotron radiation and underlining the necessity of
user involvement in the early design stages of a new project.