The scientific conference on “Advancements in Nuclear Instrumentation Measurement Methods and their Applications (ANIMMA 2009)” was held from June 7–10 at the Palais des Congrès in Marseille, France. The conference was cosponsored by the IEEE NPSS as part of the initiative to reintroduce nuclear-energy-related topics back into NPSS meetings. The conference was attended by about 430 participants from 35 countries on five continents. Almost 90 oral presentations were given and over 150 posters were shown.
The conference received the active support of the IEEE NPSS, the European Nuclear Society, and the French Nuclear Energy Society, and the support of the Provence Alpes Cote d’Azur Region, the city of Marseille and many industrial partners.
The ANIMMA conference was opened by Catherine Cesarsky, High Commissioner for Atomic Energy, Professor Jean-Paul Caverni, President of the University of Provence, Loïck Martin-Deidier, Deputy Director of the Nuclear Energy Directorate, Professor Franck Deconinck, President of the Belgian Nuclear Research Center SCK-CEN, and Jorgen Kjems, Chairman of the European Strategy Forum on Research Infrastructures.
This conference was initiated and organized by CEA, the French Atomic Energy Commission, in close partnership, with the University of Provence and the Belgian Nuclear Research Centre SCK-CEN, all aware of the importance of instrumentation and measurement at the heart of nuclear activities and aware of the considerable impact of these sciences on many other fields.
Three objectives had been established for the ANIMMA conference:
- To be an international conference of high scientific quality oriented towards innovation.
- To be a multidisciplinary conference concerning the instrumentation and measurement methods carried out and implemented in specifically nuclear fields, such as fundamental physics and nuclear energy, but also concerning instrumentation using radiation developed and implemented in fields as varied as security, the environment and medical sciences.
- To constitute the meeting place of all communities concerned by instrumentation and measurement, to unite, consolidate and organize an international network of scientific and industrial experts, to share expressed needs, knowledge and experience, and to establish the most innovative collaborations with scientists and effective partnerships with industrial firms.
These objectives were met during the conference with a wide international participation, and notably that of many internationally recognized scientists and experts in all fields covered by ANIMMA.
There were actions taken to interest young generations of scientists in instrumentation and measurements sciences with the participation of the Instrumentation Department of the University of Provence and the INSTN. About 50 students from INSTN and the Instrumentation Department took part in the ANIMMA conference. This enabled them to meet researchers and industrial firms.
An exhibition of twenty-five booths represented research laboratories, industrial partners, and many specialized companies that make specific, high-performance instrumentation related to the conference.
To close the conference, a visit to the CEA-Cadarache Centre was organized on June 11, 2009. It enabled ANIMMA participants to visit the CEA facilities particularly devoted to the development or implementation of instrumentation and advanced measurement methods, and to have an overview of the large facilities under construction in Cadarache, notably the Jules Horowitz research reactor and the ITER fusion energy project.
The success of ANIMMA 2009 has confirmed the real interest in this conference and the justification for its objectives. Thus ANIMMA will be a permanent biennial conference. The next conference will take place in 2011 and will be organized by the Belgian Nuclear Research Centre.
The authors can be reached as follows: Richard Kouzes: Pacific Northwest National Laboratory, PO Box 999, MS K7-36, Richland, WA 99352; Phone: +1 509-372-4858; Fax: 509-372-4969; E-mail: richard.kouzes@pnl.gov; Christoph Ilgner: Technische Universität Dortmund, Experimentelle Physik 5, 44221 Dortmund, Germany; Phone: +41-22-76-72969; Fax: +41-22-76-79080; E-mail: Christoph.Ilgner@cern.ch; Patrick LeDû: Groupe CAS, Institut de Physique Nucleaire, Bât. Paul Dirac, 4 rue Enrico Fermi, 69100 Villeurbanne cedex, France; Jean-Luc Leray: CEA, bat 447, 91191 Gif-sur-Yvette cedex, France; Tel +33 1 64 50 20 41 (A: 22 64); E-mail: jean-luc.leray@cea.fr. |
