US Advanced Light Source Upgrade Advances, Soft X-ray Brightness to Increase at Least 100-Fold

Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory in the US is advancing the Advanced Light Source (ALS) synchrotron upgrade project, planning to enhance soft X-ray experimental capabilities through next-generation light source technology, providing higher-precision data support for quantum materials, microelectronics, energy technologies, biological structure research, and AI-assisted scientific research. The project team is working toward the 2029 target.

Since the Advanced Light Source began operation in 1993, it has long served research across soft X-ray, ultraviolet, infrared, and hard X-ray wavelength ranges. Researchers worldwide have used the facility's focused beams to observe molecular and material structures at the atomic scale, with results cited in over 18,000 papers and supporting numerous important fundamental research efforts.

Upon completion of this upgrade, the ALS will produce soft X-ray beams that are more focused and at least 100 times brighter than current levels. The higher brightness and coherence of the beams will enable researchers to more clearly probe the chemical, magnetic, and electronic properties of materials, observe electron behavior and real-time changes in chemical reactions, thereby obtaining more detailed and precise experimental data.

In the quantum technology domain, the upgraded ALS will enhance research capabilities such as X-ray scattering and angle-resolved photoemission spectroscopy (ARPES), enabling analysis of electron distributions in quantum materials and spintronic devices at approximately 10-nanometer scales, providing experimental evidence for quantum device design.

Microelectronics is also a key application area for the ALS upgrade. The facility and its X-ray Optics Center have provided foundational support for extreme ultraviolet (EUV) lithography research. With the increased brightness from the upgrade, researchers will further investigate photoresist material reactions at the molecular and nanoscale, providing material and process understanding for next-generation microchip manufacturing technologies such as high-NA EUV lithography.

In energy technology, the upgraded ALS will observe catalytic reactions, battery material activation, aging, and failure processes with higher spatial and temporal resolution, helping researchers understand charged particle structural changes inside batteries and details of catalytic reactions, providing a basis for developing new batteries and related energy systems.

Biological research will also benefit from this upgrade. The ALS will install new hardware and software on X-ray crystallography and small-angle X-ray scattering (SAXS) beamlines, and establish a crystallography sample preparation facility. These capabilities can be used to resolve atomic structures of biomolecules, study conformational changes in proteins and other biological molecules, and provide experimental support for drug development.

Furthermore, the upgraded ALS will generate higher-quality, higher-throughput datasets that can be used to train artificial intelligence models to assist in predicting physical and chemical reactions. Combined with sample-handling robots and automated analysis tools, the research team hopes to further improve experimental efficiency and accelerate the transition from nanoscale observations to materials innovation.