In October, researchers voiced concerns when Australia’s Nuclear Science and Technology Organisation (ANSTO) began drawing up plans to close two beamlines at the country’s synchrotron.

Now, ANSTO has changed tack and says that while the terahertz/far-infrared beamline, which ceased operations in March 2025, will not be available in 2026, the infrared microspectroscopy beamline – also previously slated for closure – will still be available.

There are many applications of the terahertz/far-infrared beamline, including study of explosives, pigments and nanomaterials. Meanwhile the infrared microspectroscopy beamline can also be used across several different sectors – including fingerprint analysis, analysing food composition and learning about natural and synthetic fibres.

‘Due to increased revenue certainty, the proposal to cease operations of [the infrared microspectroscopy] instrument is withdrawn,’ reads a document issued by the agency that summarises the changes. Discussions are ongoing with external stakeholders to fund this beamline. Michael Jones, research infrastructure specialist in synchrotron science at the Queensland University of Technology in Australia, says that these ‘external stakeholders’ are university employees who use these instruments.

As part of the Bright project, these universities – based in Australia and other countries – already provide A$110 million (£56 million) to build new beamlines at the synchrotron. The new agreement will see the user community also likely pay around half the operating costs of the infrared microspectroscopy beamline for the next few years to keep it running.

But Jones says he has a problem with universities footing the bill for beamlines. ‘I wouldn’t like to see it get to the point where they then just keep doing this for all beamlines,’ he says, noting that this could lead to discrimination between the instruments used by wealthy and non-wealthy users.

No external funding for the terahertz/far-infrared beamline was forthcoming from the user community, Jones says, so that will remain closed. ‘I don’t think that the work that it does is any less important than the infrared [microspectroscopy] beamline, for instance, or any of the other beamlines,’ he notes. ‘It just seems to have a lower output and a slower output.’

As it’s harder to turn the raw data into meaningful output, it was perceived as not as useful, Jones says. ‘I think it was harder for the users to convince the university management that it was worth funding,’ he notes.

The International Synchrotron Access Program, which covered travel costs, has also been shut down. Jones has used the access programme to learn new techniques at other synchrotrons around the world and bring them back to Australia. ‘I think it’s been very useful,’ he says, noting that it’s difficult to get funding to travel to international synchrotrons. ‘This will stifle some development in Australia.’

Megan Maher, a chemical biologist at the University of Melbourne, Australia, says ANSTO should have consulted with the user community before announcing cuts. ‘They could have recruited some of these key people from our scientific community to talk about the problems they were facing and maybe come up with solutions, but that’s not how it was done,’ she notes. ‘We still don’t know on what basis those particular facilities were chosen to be shut down, such as usage or scientific output.’

An ANSTO spokesperson tells Chemistry World the process to reach the final decision was ‘transparent and equitable, including a comprehensive consultation with both internal and external stakeholders’. The spokesperson adds: ‘As a result of feedback, changes were able to be made, including the retention of some capability, such as the infrared microspectroscopy beamline at the Australian Synchrotron and the support of cosmogenic dating at the Centre for Accelerator Science.’