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Announcement of the J-PARC MLF Call for General Use Proposals (Short term and One-year) (CLOSED)

The J-PARC MLF is pleased to announce the opening of the Call for General Use Proposals (Short term and One-year (BL11 only)) from Wednesday, 17 June 2020.

Please note the following:
  • Due to the COVID-19 situation, proposals are called for this time as below:
    • Short term General Use Proposals for the operation period of 2020B + 2021A (from December 2020 to June 2021 (Tentative))
    • One-year General Use Proposals (BL11 only) for the operation period of 2020B + 2021A, and 2021B (from December 2020 to March 2022 (Tentative))
  • The call for proposals in October and November (for 2021A round) may not be held this year depending on the situation.
  • The experimental subjects until 2020A that could not be carried out due to the impact of COVID-19 will be discussed. The expiration date will be extended to the end of fiscal 2020.
  • There is a possibility that the experiments cannot be implemented subject to the national and local governments’ policies for COVID-19.

1. Deadline:

17:00 Wednesday, 15 July 2020 (Japan Standard Time)

* Demand on the Proposal Submission System is typically very high on the closing day. You are strongly recommended to submit your proposal well in advance of the deadline.

2. How to submit

Submission

Note

  • Obtain the consent of the person before registering him/her as a collaborator (The proposal may be rejected if the collaborator’s name is written without his/her consent.)
  • It is recommended to consult the instrument scientist prior to proposal submission on the sample environment, experiment condition, etc.
    The contact information, sample environment, specs of the instrument, etc. can be found in the page of the instrument.
  • Please write the application form in Enlgish. (Application written in Japanese is accepted limited to P7 Industrial Applications and P9 New User Promotion.)

3. Experiment period and estimation of beam time

Experiment period:

General Use Proposal (Short term) December 2020 -- June 2021 (tentative)
General Use Proposal (One-year, BL11 only) December 2020 -- March 2022 (tentative)

※Please note that the periods are different this time.

Estimation of beamtime:

Estimate the beamtime with beam power of 600 kW.

4. Eligibility to apply

  1. Researchers belonging to a university, private company, public research institute, etc.
  2. Graduate students (masters and PhD students) *

* Instructions for the proposal by a graduate student

  • Graduate students intending to make an application as a Principal Investigator are required to contact the instrument scientists before submitting the proposal.
  • Enter “Graduate Student” in the field of the applicant’s job title.
  • The applicant’s academic supervisor must be registered as a Collaborator. In the field of job title, add “AS” after his/her job title.
  • An academic staff member of the applicant’s university, which includes his/her academic supervisor, and research collaborator (not including graduate students) is required to attend and supervise the experiment (experiment supervisor). The experiment supervisor must be included as a Collaborator. In the field of job title, add “ES” after his/her job title.
  • If AS and ES are not entered on the form, the application is not received.
  • If the proposal is approved, the academic supervisor is required to submit the specified pledge for implementing the experiment.

With regard to applicants belonging to the organizations listed in the Foreign End User List of METI or the nationals of non-NPT countries, eligibility to apply is decided in consultation with MEXT etc.

5. Instruments available for General Use Proposal

Please contact the instrument scientist for the specification of the instrument

Instrument available for General Use Proposal (Short term)

Neutron Instruments

Neutron Diffraction
Inelastic Neutron Scattering
SANS and Neutron Reflectometry
Other Neutron Instruments

Muon Instruments

Muon Spectroscopy

Instrument available for General Use Proposal (One-year)

Neutron Instrument

6. Choose the review field

Please choose the appropriate category from the list below. The proposal is reviewed by the subcommittee of the category.
List of keywords for each sub-committee.

Neutron (※Categories of research fields were changed in 2020A)

P1 Structural Science (Crystal, Amorphous and Liquid)
P2 Energy Science and High-Pressure Science
P3 Soft Matter and Biological Matter
P4 Magnetic Material and Strongly Correlated Electron System (Structure)
P5 Magnetic Material and Strongly Correlated Electron System (Dynamics)
P6 Fundamental Physics, Nuclear Physics, Instrumentation, Imaging
P7 Industrial Applications(※1)
P8 Materials Engineering
P9 New User Promotion(※2)

Muon

Q1 Electronic Properties of Matter & Hydrogen in Matter
Q2 General Applications

(※1)Application for P7 “Industrial Applications” is limited to the proposals from PIs belonging to private companies.

(※2)Application for P9 “New User Promotion” is limited to the proposals for which pre-application has been submitted.

7. Evaluation criteria

  • Submitted proposals are assessed and selected based on the evaluation criteria.
  • The scientific value of the proposal and the appropriateness of the necessary beamtime will be taken into consideration when deciding the beamtime.

8. Please Note

  1. The use of samples including nuclear fuel materials/elements as a sample is prohibited. Only RI samples permitted by the MLF may be used.
  2. Be sure to consult the instrument scientist prior to proposal submission if special sample environment (magnet etc.) is required.
  3. If the sub-committee decided that a different beamline is more suitable for the experiment than the beamline you have chosen, the beamline may be changed.
  4. Users who intend to bring in electrical equipment whose power output rating is 7.5kW and above/7.5kVA and above or equipment whose current rating is 30A and above must include the detailed equipment specifications in the research plan.
  5. KEK beamlines (refer to “Instruments available”) cannot accept undergraduate students as Collaborators. However, they can participate in the research as interns. If a graduate student participates as a Collaborator, write “Graduate Student” in the field of the job title.
  6. Experiment is not allowed to be implemented if it is attended only by students (including graduate students).
  7. If researchers belonging to a private company want to use a muon instrument, please contact us at the email address indicated at the bottom in advance.
  8. J-PARC also welcomes Preliminary (P-type) proposals to use the muon instruments at the MLF. For the details, please click here. If submitting a P-type proposal, please designate it as such within the online system when prompted.
  9. For using Ibaraki Neutron Beamline (BL03,BL20) for industrial purposes or in the framework of the Innovative Research Proposal (Overseas academic user program), please apply for the proposal call by Ibaraki Prefecture. The prefecture accepts the industrial application proposal throughout the year. For the details, please click here.

9. Element Strategy Initiative and Complementary Use

  • Please indicate if your research has some relevance with the Japanese national priority research areas as identified in the Elements Strategy Initiative, or if your proposed research includes, or is likely to include in the future, the complementary use of other major research facilities such as, but not limited to, synchrotron radiation sources (SPring-8, SACLA, PF etc.), supercomputer (HPCI with K computer etc.), or other quantum beam facilities. If either of the above applies to your proposal, please indicate by marking the relevant check box and adding a brief description as requested. This information will be used only to survey current trends in research proposals at the MLF.

10. Charge for use

  • For Non-Proprietary Use, charge for use is exempted by publishing the results.
  • Proprietary Use Charge is 2,983,000 JPY / day

11. Publication of results (Non-Proprietary Use)

  • The PI of Non-proprietary use experiment is required to submit an Experimental Report within 60 days after the end of the proposal term of your experiment (deadline of report is here). These reports will be open to public on the J-PARC Web site.
  • Please publish the results of the experiment within 3 years after the completion of the experiment.
  • Submission of the Experiment Reports of the past experiments conducted at the MLF and the publication of the results will be taken into account in the assessment of the submitted proposals.
  • When publishing the results, it is recommended to consult with the Instrument scientists in advance about who should be the co-author. It is also important to take into account the support provided by the Instrument scientists and other staffs maintaining and operating the facility when deciding the co-authors. Please also indicate the proposal number and the beamline(s) used for the experiment in the publishment.

12. Disclosure of information

  • The information on the approved and completed experiment (Non-proprietary use and Proprietary use) will be made available on the website.

Approved Experiments

Proposal number, PI’s name, Affiliation, Nationality of the PI’s affiliation, Beamline number, Allocated beamtime.

Completed experiments

Title of Proposal, Allocated beamtime

13. Contact Us

J-PARC Center Users' Office

For Non-Proprietary Use: j_proposal [at] ml.j-parc.jp
For Proprietary Use: j_proposal_p [at] ml.j-parc.jp
For General Questions: jimurisoku [at] ml.j-parc.jp