The High Energy Materials Science Beamline HEMS at PETRA III is dedicated to high energy x-ray diffraction (XRD) and imaging techniques. It is tunable in the range 32 to 200 keV, and it is optimized for micrometer focusing with compound refractive lenses (CRLs).
In-house and development activities are shared between HZG (Helmholtz-Zentrum Geesthacht, Centre for Materials and Coastal Research, previously named Research Center Geesthacht, GKSS) and DESY. HZG is focusing on engineering materials science applications with two experimental hutches, and DESY operates one experimental hutch for high-energy XRD experiments.
HEMS has partly been operational since summer 2010. Regular user operation started June 2011, the latest decicated instrumentation (3D-XRD grain mapping) has been commissioned end of 2013.
The materials and general science activities are threefold:
Fundamental research encompasses metallurgy, physics, chemistry, biology etc. which are more and more merging. Experiments had been done for the investigation of the relation between macroscopic and micro-structural properties of polycrystalline materials, grain-grain-interactions, recrystallisation processes, the development of new & smart materials or processes, and in situ catalysis mechanisms. Generally, all kinds of matter can be studied with high precision, high stability and low background: surfaces, interfaces, bulk single crystals, powders as well as amophous materials in a large reciporcal space. Optics for the study of liquid surfaces are also available.
Applied research for manufacturing process optimization benefits from high flux in combination with fast detector systems allowing complex and highly dynamic in-situ studies of microstructural transformations, e.g. during welding and loading processes. The beamline infrastructure allows easy accommodation of large user provided equipment (e.g. an in-situ friction stir welding device and a laser beam welding chamber built in-house by HZG, or a 10-T magnet for low temperature experiments run by DESY).
Experiments targeting the industrial user community are based on well established techniques with standardised evaluation, allowing "full service" measurements. Environments for strain mapping on large structural components up to 1 t are provided as well as automated investigations of large sample numbers, e.g. for tomography & texture determination.
The beamline consists of a five meter in-vacuum undulator source (U19-5) - currently a standard PETRA undulator is installed till delivery of U19-5 foreseen after the third PETRA III extension shutdown in spring 2019, the main optics hutch (OH1), an in-house test facility (EH1) and three independent experimental hutches EH2, EH3 and EH4 working alternatively, plus additional focussing optics hutches (OH2, OH3) with set-up and storage space for long-term experiments.
The Test Facility EH1 is not available for external users.