Photon Factory: A synchrotron light source for key technology and science community development

Authors

Nobumasa Funamori Institute of Materials Structure Science, KEK High Energy Accelerator Research Organization

Abstract

The Photon Factory (PF) is a synchrotron radiation facility of the Institute for Materials Structure Science and is one of the first dedicated facilities in the world that cover up to X-ray region, and the first in Asia. Currently, 48 beamlines are used in the 2.5 GeV PF ring and the 6.5 GeV PF advanced ring for research in a variety of fields.
PF is operated with an emphasis on technology development and human resource development. For example, protein crystallography and in-vacuum undulator techniques developed at PF have spread to synchrotron radiation facilities around the world. Currently, simultaneous use of soft and hard X-rays is being pioneered. In the future, simultaneous use with positrons, neutrons, muons, etc. will be explored. Researchers who grew up at PF have become leaders of the synchrotron science community in Japan. Moreover, PF has contributed to the development of synchrotron science communities in foreign countries (e.g., Australia and India) for over 30 years.
In this presentation, I would like to introduce PF and discuss how we might work together with the Filipino science community.

Author Biography

Nobumasa Funamori, Institute of Materials Structure Science, KEK High Energy Accelerator Research Organization

Professor Nobumasa Funamori received his PhD from the University of Tokyo in 1995. He worked as a postdoctoral fellow at the University of California, Berkeley, an assistant professor at Keio University, and an associate professor at the University of Tokyo, before joining the Institute of Materials Structure Science, KEK, as a professor in 2015. He holds concurrent appointments as a professor at SOKENDAI and at the University of Tokyo. After serving as the Head of the Photon Factory for five years starting in 2019, he has been serving as the Director of the Institute of Materials Structure Science since 2024.
Professor Funamori's initial specialty was high-pressure mineral physics, and he succeeded in synchrotron X-ray diffraction measurements of silicate perovskite (bridgmanite) under Earth's lower mantle conditions. He then turned his attention to the study of liquids and glasses, and has produced many results, especially on quartz glass, using synchrotron radiation. Most of these results were produced by new experimental techniques developed by his own group. Based on his experience in developing experimental techniques at the group level, as the Director of the Institute of Materials Structure Science, he is now pioneering experimental techniques on an institute/facility scale. The current focus is on the simultaneous use of two or more quantum beams (Quantum MultiBeam).

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Published

2025-06-26

Issue

2025: Proceedings of the 43rd Samahang Pisika ng Pilipinas Physics Conference

Section

Invited Presentations

License

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How to Cite

[1]

“Photon Factory: A synchrotron light source for key technology and science community development”, Proc. SPP, vol. 43, no. 1, p. SPP-2025-INV-PS-24, Jun. 2025, Accessed: Mar. 31, 2026. [Online]. Available: https://proceedings.spp-online.org/article/view/SPP-2025-INV-PS-24