Federal Minister Olaf Scholz visits DESY

Federal Minister Olaf Scholz visits a diffractometer experimental station at PETRA III.

On 11 August, Federal Minister of Labour and Social Affairs Olaf Scholz came to the research centre DESY. He informed himself of the current large scale projects at DESY and, accompanied by members of the directorate and the works council, visited the construction site of the free-electron X-ray laser European XFEL and the experiment halls of the new DESY light sources FLASH and PETRA III.

The chair of DESY´s board of directors Professor Helmut Dosch showed Olaf Scholz the construction site of the European X-ray laser, a 3.4-kilometre long facility that will extend from the DESY site in Hamburg-Bahrenfeld to the city of Schenefeld in Schleswig-Holstein. Starting in 2014, it will emit extremely intense, ultra-short light flashes with unprecedented energy. In the experiment hall of the prototype of this facility, the free-electron laser FLASH, scientists presented their experiments. FLASH is the world’s first and only free-electron laser in the soft X-ray range and it allows so far impossible insights into the nano-world.
The next station was the PETRA III experiment hall where scientists explained, by reference to their experiments that are currently being set up, how they will use the radiation of PETRA III, the world’s most brilliant storage ring X-ray source, after the start of user operation.

After a talk with the members of the directorate and the works council, Olaf Scholz departed, saying: “I hope you found all this as interesting as I did.”