The 2008 Asia Oceania Week of the Australian Synchrotron was a great success.  We would like to thank our invited speakers for contributing to this success!

CONFERENCE PHOTOS
Click here to have a look at the 2008 Meeting Photos.

FINAL PROGRAM
Final Program now available, click here to download a copy.  

1-5 December 2008, Melbourne Australia

A-O Week was a great success and a defining moment for the Australian Synchrotron.  As host of the 3rd Asia Oceania Forum on Synchrotron Radiation Research (AOFSRR) the Australian Synchrotron took its place officially amongst the Asian Oceania synchrotron community as an invited member of the AOFSRR Council.  

The week’s activities were well attended with around 300 scientists, students and research managers from 13 countries including: Australia, New Zealand, Italy, UK, France, Japan, China, Korea, Taiwan, Germany, Singapore, Canada and the USA attending talks and presentations at the St Kilda Novotel in Melbourne, Australia. Also present were government representatives from Korea, Japan and Australia.

This was the largest meeting of the Australian synchrotron community and provided an opportunity to meet and share information and ideas on local issues, and to build regional collaborations with delegates from synchrotrons across the Asia Oceania region.

The week's activities began at the conference venue with a closed meeting of the Australian Synchrotron Science Advisory Committee (SAC) on 1 December. This was followed by four days of talks beginning with the Australian Synchrotron Annual Users Meeting on 2-3 December and the remainder of the week being devoted to the 3rd AOFSRR across 4-5 December.

The User Meeting sessions ran on day 2 and 3 with one overlap session on day 4 with one half of the beamline breakouts sessions scheduled for the Thursday afternoon- the first day of the AOFSRR program.  This enabled many users to attend other beamline breakouts as well as attend the AOFSRR sessions.  The AOFSRR sessions on days 4 & 5 saw a continuation of discussions held in Taiwan on the next generation science facilities as well as a new focus on industry.  Delegates listened to updates on developments at the Australian Synchrotron, as the newest member of the synchrotron science community, as well as updates from all other lightsources in the region.

The conference attracted seven facility directors of synchrotrons in the Asia Oceania region as well as two facility directors from North American synchrotrons. The week’s events were organised by the Australian Synchrotron with a total of 114 presentations including 35 invited speakers covering the entire spectrum of synchrotron science in the region. 

Highlights included presentations from keynote speakers Professor Peter Colman from The Walter and Eliza Hall Institute in Melbourne, talking retrospectively about his work on protein structure in the development of Relenza; and Dr Anton Barty, from The Livermore National Laboratory in California, taking a look into the future with his talk on the potential capabilities of next generation facilities.

The conference was also an opportunity to hold the AOFSSR council meeting.  The AOFSRR Council has high level representation from all synchrotron facilities in the Asia Oceania region. This annual gathering of the AOFSRR council enabled members to meet and talk about regional cooperation.  The AOFSRR council made an adjustment to membership and invited Professor Robert Lamb to become a member of council representing the now operating Australian Synchrotron.  At this meeting the councillors also elected to admit non-synchrotron operating countries to associate membership status, and Shanghai was selected as the host of the next AOFSRR meeting in 2009.