Dear Colleagues and Friends:

On behalf of the host institution and the Organizing Committee of the Shanghai Symposium on Intermediate Energy Light Sources, I take great pleasure in extending my warm welcome to all the participants.

Our symposium was sponsored at a relatively later date, preparation work was actually started from February this year, that is we have only a little more than half a year to gather everybody here for this important academic occasion. Indeed it is an excellent job done!

This symposium may not be large enough in scale comparing to other such activities, but it has pooled representatives from almost all the important synchrotron radiation facilities around the world. We are proud of this success, and in addition, I would like to take this opportunity to express my hearty thanks to the directors of the represented facilities, without whose generous support we could not have possibly staged this symposium in such a short period of time. I would also like to offer my thanks to all the participants present here today who have prepared their talks and arranged their travels at such a short notice. My colleagues and I are especially happy to see those representatives from the developing new sources, some of whom made their travel decisions only at the last moment. I would also like to take this opportunity to thank our organizers both at SSRL and SSRC for their efficient work done so far. Without all those efforts of yours, this symposium could not have been imaginable, let alone such an excellent program that has been produced.

Special mention and thanks should go to those from the U.S. facilities who have come according to their original plans at this extremely difficult period of time of their country as is known to all of us. As a scientist and co-chairman of this symposium, I wish to represent all present to show our solidarity and associate ourselves with our American colleagues. Science and civilization refuse barbarism and inhumane!

As we all know, with the development of undulator technology and others, intermediate energy synchrotron light sources (especially third generation) are able to serve many of the demands of high brightness X-ray research. That offers the possibility to many countries (both developed and developing) to build and operate cheaper and advanced synchrotron light sources. These factors have led to rapid growth recently in intermediate energy synchrotron light sources in the world. The purpose of this symposium, as we stated when sponsoring this symposium, was to explore innovative accelerator and beam line technology issues of common interest, especially the many novel and innovative approaches involved so as to provide a forum of communication between the participating facilities. Considering the wide representation and the fact that our symposium is being organized against the general background of burgeoning new synchrotron radiation facilities around the world that are either in concept or in design, I am certain that we can achieve our purpose and goals. I would say it is the first time for us to hold this kind of symposium in China, through which we can learn from each other and put the many innovative experience and techniques into each other’s own design and construction. I hope we can have more of these exchanges in the future.

Proceeding from this purpose and thanks to the active participation of all the speakers and the efforts of members of the Program Committee, an excellent program has been produced. The topics of this program are ranging from such general topics as facility overviews to those detailed technological ones as innovative storage ring technologies, stability issues, vacuum chambers, beam line components, insertion devices and so on. With the efforts of all the participants and such a wide-ranging program, I believe we have got all the basics of a successful symposium.

Six years have passed since from 1995, SSRF has not been formally approved (which is beyond our expectation) though its design and R&D have been successfully finished. We may have to wait for two more years until the government makes its final decision. With the efforts of a strong team of about 100 experienced scientists and engineers and the support of our colleagues both at home and abroad, I believe we can win the final approval simply because China needs this facility.

To conclude my remarks, I wish the symposium full success and wish everybody a pleasant stay in Shanghai, a beautiful city in its best season now.