Research proposals are applied via the dedicated web system for proposal application, NSL RING (NSL Research Information NaviGator).

NSL RING Top page

For the operating environment, we have confirmed the smooth operation with Microsoft Edge (Win) and Google Chrome (Win/Mac).

If you do not have your account of NSL RING, please create an account first. (It takes about 5 minutes.) 

• Qualified principal investigators (PI) should be faculty members, researchers, postdoctoral researchers, or researchers with equivalent positions who belong to domestic and overseas universities, national and public research institutes, independent administrative agencies, etc.

• Overseas PI should select the most appropriate Japanese contact person to perform experiments and various document procedures together. Experiments conducted by Japanese proxy (so-called remote experiments) are basically not allowed. 

• Proposals from overseas will be reviewed fairly in the same manner as domestic proposals, but in principle, the number of accepted proposals will be limited to 20-30% of all accepted proposals of each instrument. This percentage depends on the instrument to be used and is determined by Neutron Scattering Program Advisory Committees (NSPAC). 

• We will accept proposals submitted from doctoral course graduate students (including master's course graduate students planning to proceed to doctoral course). In this case, please download the "Academic Supervisor Approval" from below, fill in the necessary information, and submit it via email. Input your academic advisor in "Research Collaborator 1." of your proposal.

     Academic Supervisor Approval

     e-mail ： nsl-appl [at] issp.u-tokyo.ac.jp

• Graduate students who do not correspond to the above cannot become principal investigators. In this case, the graduate students should be the research collaborators.

• Those who belong to companies cannot become principal investigators.  But we encourage company researchers to contact instrument leaders, discuss own research with them and, if accepted, conduct experiments in IRT (Instrumentation and Research Team) beamtimes.

Please read the below carefully and carry out the application procedure without any deficiencies.

How to use NSL RING (Notes on filling in)

NSL RING Manual

How to write up research plan

Research plans are uploaded in NSL RING.

How to Write up Research Plan

Submitted research proposals will be reviewed by two processes. One is "academic evaluation" by a committee member in charge of each research field and two external reviewers, the other is "technical review" by IRT. Then, each proposal was finally reviewed by the Neutron Scattering Program Advisory Committees (NSPAC) to determine the acceptance or rejection of the proposal including the number of days of the experiment.  The results will be notified to the principal investigators around mid-March.

• After the experiments, please submit the activity  reports via NSL Activity Webpage.

• GUP experiments at JRR-3 are basically performed under the support by IRT members and technicians. So, when you publish the results of approved proposals, please consult with instrument leaders in advance and include IRT members as co-authors appropriately. Also, please clearly state the instrument used in the experiment. Furthermore, please write the proposal Nos. related to the experiment in acknowledgments section etc. as in the following example.

This work was carried out by the JRR-3 general user program managed by the Institute for Solid State Physics, the University of Tokyo (Proposal Nos. ********, ********). 

Demonstrating the results of GUP is extremely important for future operations of JRR-3 and GUP.  We appreciate your cooperation.

12 instruments belonging to universities at JRR-3 are classified into one of the following two types.

• Type-A:  Instruments mainly opened to general users. 50% of total beam time per year (usually about 80 days) will be allocated to users.

• Type-B: Instruments mainly for instrument development, project research, education by IRT. The proposal by general users is possible but should be accepted by the instrument leader in advance.  The percentage of beamtime for users is not fixed.

→ The list of university-owned instruments in JRR-3 and the instrument leaders. 

For the list of instruments, please refer to "(Page2) Instrument Sample Environment" in "2. How to Fill in Proposal Application Form" in Proposal Application Guide.  6 Triple-axis spectrometers (3 reactor hall, 5 thermal guide, 1 cold guide) are available in GUP. Only for the proposals using triple-axis spectrometers, 3 spectrometers can be selected in rank order.

The handling instructions and safety precautions for the samples and bringing-in devices (if any) are required to be answered or described in proposals. We appreciate your cooperation.

The details of application fields and the method of answer and description are provided in the manual for proposal application. Please be sure to read it carefully.

Researchers from foreign institutions are required by law to undergo security export control review before their experiments in Japan. Your application will be reviewed by the Export Control Office of the University of Tokyo. Please note that if your application does not pass the screening, you will not be able to conduct the experiment. 

All of the principal investigators and research collaborators are required to submit a Letter of acceptance before their experiments. Please note that even if you do not come to JRR-3 for your experiment, you have to submit a Letter of acceptance to register your name as a research collaborator. For details, please refer to "Instruction for Visits" page.

Institute for Materials Research, Tohoku University, offers Mail-in Service for the powder diffractometer T1-3 HERMES.  This is only for HERMES.

In the Mail-in Service, the proposers send measurement samples to us, and the instrument staff will perform the experiment upon your request and provide experimental data to the proposers via email.

The number of acceptance of the proposals eligible for the Mail-in Service is limited since we are rather short-handed.

If you wish to use the Mail-in Service, please make sure to consult with the instrument staff prior to submitting your proposals.

When preparing proposals, please write "Request for Mail-in Service at HERMES" in the "Additional notes for using this instrument" field on the "Instrument Sample Environment" page of the proposal application form. 

For a complementary use of neutron scattering and X-ray scattering, we have small-angle X-ray scattering instrument SAXS-U (Aanton Paar, SAXS Point 2.0). If you want to use SAXS-U as well as SANS-U, please describe that in your proposal for SANS-U. Please contact the instrument leader of SANS-U if you are interested in using SAXS-U. 

Please consult with the instrument leader in advance regarding the available range of momentum transfer Q and Fourier time. 

Reserved Proposals

If machine time becomes available due to cancellation of other experiments etc., reserved proposals are possibly performed in consultation with the instrument leaders.

Consumables

• Consumables such as sample containers are basically to be prepared by users. Please contact the instrument leader in advance.

• Liquid nitrogen is to be provided by our facility.

• The cost of liquid helium is to be borne by users.  Please contact the instrument leader or technical staff members for details.

• Due to the recent rise in the price of liquid helium, if you are applying for a proposal that uses sample environment equipment that uses a large amount of liquid helium, such as a superconducting magnet, please consult with the instrument leaders in advance. Some proposals may be rejected because of the use of large amounts of liquid helium, though depending on the ranking of proposals.

Research proposals are accepted once per year in principle.  However, when there is a particularly urgent proposal, it can be submitted as needed. 

Please contact the below.

e-mail :   nsl-appl [at] issp.u-tokyo.ac.jp