PSI Center for Neutron and Muon Sciences

Neutron scattering techniques are highly versatile and powerful tools for studying the structure and dynamics of condensed matter. A wide scope of problems, ranging from fundamental to solid state physics and chemistry, and from materials science to biology, medicine and environmental science, can be investigated with neutrons. In addition to scattering, non-diffractive methods like imaging techniques allows for non-destructive inspection of materials and components, providing information on their internal structure, composition, and integrity with growing relevance also for industrial applications.

The Swiss muon source – powered by the PSI 590 MeV cyclotron with a proton current of 2200 mA – is the world's most intense continuous beam muon source. The proton beam hits two graphite targets. Attached to those are seven beamlines for muon (or pion) extraction, two of them are equipped with superconducting decay channels. The available muon energies range from 0.5 keV to 60 MeV.

With particle beams made up of pions, muons, neutrons, protons, and electrons, researchers are investigating how our universe is constructed. The Swiss research infrastructure for particle physics – CHRISP –  enables them to determine fundamental natural constants with the greatest precision and to look for deviations from the current standard model of particle physics.