LhARA fortnightly Meeting 14^th September 2021; 14:00 BST

Notes

1. Notes of previous meetings and actions
   
   • Status of actions:
     • None recorded.

2. Preparation of LhARA proposal and work package reports:
   • Skeleton and planning: K. Long
     • Skeleton updated following discussions with WPMs. Now installed on Overleaf and in WORD. The Work Package Managers pages on the wiki will be used to gather information for the proposal. Meetings, notes, and information will be posted and can be accessed by all. Updates will be presented at the regular meetings.
   • Stakeholder plan update: (KL), J. Parsons, P. Price
     • The proposal needs to include a well-thought-out stakeholder engagement plan. Sincethe LhARA programme is multidisciplinary and targets a number of end points the plan needs to be more carefully developed than is typical for a single-topic proposal in the natural sciences.
     • The discussion of the definition of the Stakeholder Plan has begun. One goal is to identify the people or groups who may wishe to be involved in, or to contribute to the project, those that seek to benefit, thise that we need to influence, and those who control resource or influence. The Stakeholder Plan needs to include the development of the PPI activity. A workshop to develop the PPI progranmme is being organised.
     • Among the stakeholders are the UK research councils. These sit under UKRI. Contacts are each of the relevant RCs are to be identified (action KL: make initial list of RCs and initiate identification of contacts),
     • The LhARA collaboration has contributions from each of the four UK Nations. The idea of making appropriate contacts in each of the Nations has been agreed. The concept can be extended to regional contacts, perhaps through MPs since the regional development agencies are no longer active.
     • Links with overseas labs need to be developed, including MoUs where approprate. A Collaboration Agreement with CERN is with the legal departments at CERN and STFC. Otehr relevant laboratories also need to be considered.
     • PP highlighted the need to make contact with "decision makers" (Lords and Commons). Need to think about possible topics for written questions. The development of such an activity probable needs to be coordinated.
     • PP asked for input on who the key persons/groups are/will be going forward. In relation to the development of contacts with decision makers, HH commented that this can take time. In considering this, PP emphasised that the LhARA programme is at the early stage of its lifecycle and the need is to get the opportunity and benefits across to the widest audience.
     • TG: Noted the possibility that the "Levelling-up agenda" could be targetted to supoort the develoipment of the concept for the project. PP agreed that this was a good idea and sghould be considered. The idea resonated with HH too. HH commented that the development of the case for the project should also see to exploit the government's ambition to raise teh profile of forefront science in the UK. PP agreed.
     • SG: Pointed out that EPSRC was a key stakeholder as it had funded both the A-SAIL programme and radiobiology projects.
     • PW: Noted the history of the ALIS/4GLS projects in relation to the leveling-up agenda. He noted that the Heseltine review of science in the nortwest. The Heseltine report called for a new project at DL to enhance the scientific activity of the region. The DL campus now has a good industrial research activity but had relatively smaller impact in curiosity-driven science. Building the LhARA case might enhance this too. The Universiry of Liverpool has set up the Heseltine Institute which has produced a report on teh benefits of a new project at DL. PP asked for copies of the reports mentioned (Action PW: provide Hesletine and Heseltine Institute reports to PP).
     • NB: Commented that a document had been produced on the benefits that accrued from teh SRS. The document, which was produced after the closure of the SRS, is valuable since it can be used to evaluate the benefit of a scientific infrastructure such as LhARA without being directly a "campaigning document".
     • We discussed the need to make contact with the relevant MPs. As noted above such an activity may need to be coordinated. We didnt set an action, but, KL: will try and put together a list of MPs with institutes/entitities in their area who are part of the LhARA collaboration or who may benefit.
     • KK: Emphasised the importance of looking at opportunities across the research councils given the multidisciplinary nature of the activity. She also suggested that ESRC be included in the consideration in view of the societal impacts.
     • TG: Noted that the CASSIM project that was conceived after Diamond was approved at RAL included the development of proton therapy. The history of this initiative was discussed by SG and PW who had been closely involved in the development of the case and PP who had been involved in its peer review. The key issue for LhARA is the need to be clear about the motivation for our programme and to be scienfically and technically robust in its development.
   • Work package reports:
     1. Project Management: J. Parsons, C. Whyte
        • Work has begun to define the costing of the PM w/p. The costing includes support for collaboration and project meetings, various staff functions, and support for stakeholder engagement, travel, etc.
     2. Laser-driven source: E. Boella, N. Dover, R. Gray
        • Progress has been made on on incorporatig the development of active flux stabilisation early in the programme. Contacts had been made with other groups with a view to exploring collaboration. Collaboration in the area of target development has been discussed with the Queens University, Belfast. In addition, the discussion of inkind collaboraiotn with SLAC are underway. The STFC CLF is keen to be involved particularly in the area of target development and, in view of the active development of EPAC, the exploitation of ML techniques for laser/target optimisation and beam stabilisation.
     3. Ion capture: M. Charlton, W. Bertsche
        • The structure of the w/p remains as summarised at previous meetings. Writing tasks etc. have been distributed, without disent. This morning a profitable meeting had taken place on the interfaces between WP2 and WP3. The groups are now working together to get "best-possible marriage" of the two areas. Contacts were being made with the Berkeley non-neutral plasma group with a view to some form of collaboration or cross fertilisation..
        • KL: explained the interactions he had had with members of the Imperial Aeronautics Engineer group around the simulation of plasma instabilities. The relevant individuals will be invtied to the source and capture working group meetings.
     4. Dose-deposition profiling: J. Bamber, J. Mattheson
        • See slide. In the discussion KL noted that Emma Harris, a colleague of JB's at ICR has agreed to take an interest in the ion acoustic dose profiling work package.
     5. Vertical beam line and biological end station development: R. McLauchlan, T. Price
        • KL report on behalf of RM and TP that work on the definition of the work package continues. The vertical beamline costing will be based on the work of R. Marmutov and a consultation would be organised to identify key requirements for the endstations.
        • TP has made contact with C. Welsch about low-energy ion beam diagnostics.
     6. Accelerator design and integration: N. Bliss, J. Pasternak
        • The key development since the last meeting has been that N. Bliss has joined J. Pasternak as co-lead for the w/p. JPa has made a first evaluation of the requirements of the beam-line design w/p. Work with NB to evaluate the integration aspects of the wirk will now begin.
        • CW emphasised the fact that the role and importance of the integration aspects of this work package will grow.
3. Outreach:
   
   1. Publications:
      • White paper:
        • Brief update KL: skeleton completed and being prepared in Overleaf. Meeting with lead authors led to revision of section headings. Changes have been implemented. Try to bring more concrete updates from next meeting.
      • LhARA design update:
        • Getting started, brief update: KL: JPa has agreed to lead the preparation of the LhARA design-update paper.
   2. Conferences:
      • FLASH
      • Vienna Conference on Instrumentation

4. DoNM :
   • 28Sep21

5. AoB

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