President Ma Ying-jeou on Sunday presided over the launch of Taiwan Photon Source… an initiative that has produced one of the most powerful lights in the world.
Taiwan’s National Synchrotron Radiation Research Center is the organization behind the NT$7 billion project. That’s a price tag of about US$224 million.
Acting Minister of Science and Technology Jason Lin said Sunday that light offers the best medium for observing nature. Ever since the founding of the Nobel Prize, he said, more than 20 Nobel laureates have used x-ray technology in their award-winning research, in the areas of physics, chemistry and medicine.
The minister said that the synchrotron light created by Taiwan Photon Source is more than a trillion times brighter than the light created by conventional x-ray tubes. It is expected to boost development in Taiwan’s biology, genomic medicine, and nanotechnology sectors.
At Sunday’s launch, President Ma lauded the team behind the Taiwan Photon Source, noting that the technology was designed, constructed, assembled and tested entirely by Taiwanese. He said the cutting-edge project was a milestone in the transformation of the nation’s high-tech sector.