The ESFRI Forum’s meeting in Szeged visited ELI ALPS - Interview with ESFRI Chair Jose Luis Martinez Pena

ESFRI delegates visiting ELI ALPS

The European Strategy Forum on Research Infrastructures (ESFRI Forum) held its 89th meeting at the University of Szeged on 16-17 September 2024. The ESFRI Forum was established in 2002 to promote a coherent, strategy-led approach to policy-making on research infrastructures (RIs) in Europe and to facilitate multilateral initiatives leading to the better use and development of RIs. An important objective of the ESFRI Forum is to produce a roadmap of the current situation and future goals of European RIs every 3 to 5 years, identifying the research infrastructures that are critical at pan-European level and essential for the long-term needs of European research communities.

During the two-day meeting, the participants discussed the tasks related to the preparation of ESFRI Roadmap 2026, the role of research infrastructures, in particular in the EU’s research framework programme for the next budget cycle (FP10), and the relationship of RIs with other European initiatives such as EOSC, EDICs, TIs. As a closing event of the meeting, the delegates visited ELI ALPS, where the research capacities offered by the ELI Facilities were presented by ELI ERIC Director General Allen Weeks. His presentation was followed by a tour of the laboratories, where delegates were able to see the unique equipment of the research facility.


ELI sat down with ESFRI Chair Jose Luis Martinez Pena and spoke about the future of the European research infrastructure landscape and ELI.

Everyone agrees that Research Infrastructures (RIs) play a crucial role in Europe’s future. World-class science makes the continent competitive. Excellent RIs are therefore essential for Europe’s future. Ensuring the sustainability of this ecosystem is critical, but this is a difficult task because it is a very diverse ecosystem of RIs and the situation varies from country to country. One of the main aims of my Chair period is to contribute to achieving this sustainability by promoting synergies and cooperation between all the actors in the system, including local decision-makers, national governments, EU institutions and industry and aligning these players in a holistic way to contribute to a healthy and diverse scientific ecosystem in Europe.

ESFRI Chair Jose Luis Martinez Pena

How important is Europe’s investment in large-scale RIs like ELI for maintaining global scientific competitiveness? What is ESFRI’s role in strengthening the sustainability of RIs in the current challenging political and economic European landscape?

The main goal of RIs is to produce excellenct science but the impact goes beyond that to the local and regional environment. Local businesses, but also education benefit from the knowledge exchange and training. Many of the RIs are unique and promote the internationalisation of science and knowledge. These cutting-edge technologies and highly skilled people together will ensure Europe's future competitiveness. ESFRI supports this by providing a mechanism for monitoring [the RIs] and helping Member States make decisions about the future and sustainability of the research landscape.

Ensuring that science continues to improve requires a continued investment, both in existing facilities and new facilities, which takes a significant amount of money. While it is very important to build new research centres, cutting-edge technology must be kept running for decades. The key is to achieve an equilibrium and ensure the lifecycle costs of each RI are covered. ESFRI has helped with the strategic and efficient development of this ecosystem.

ESFRI has been assessing European RIs for the last two years and our report has been shared with all stakeholders. This helps Member States and the EU to make decisions that will underpin sustainable development. Preserving excellence means to continuously evolve and improve. My recommendation to ELI is to broaden its portfolio and offer new interfaces and applications. At the same time, ELI should also focus on increasing and diversifying the number of users, this will guarantee the sustainability of the facility.

ELI is a unique example of scientific collaboration in the world and an excellent case of effective use of structural funds which should be communicated widely. ELI is already having a significant impact. At Madrid airport, I met an old acquaintance who I hadn’t seen for years, and he asked me why I was travelling to Budapest. I explained that I was going to Szeged. It turned out that he had performed an experiment at ELI ALPS. This is an example of how research facilities attract professionals from all over the world. ELI can be a platform to promote the science and technical capacities which is an added value on a local, regional and national level. Be proud of your centres!

One of our recommendations to European leaders for FP10 is to incentivise international cooperation in all areas. Our rapidly changing world requires cooperation and efficiency. ELI should be open and effectively engage in international science.

In our increasingly complex world, most problems require an interdisciplinary approach. To address these challenges boundaries need to be broken down to move towards multidisciplinarity. RIs will have to diversify and attract new users across different fields to support this.

”What is the role of RIs for enhancing innovation and what is your recommendation for policy makers in the field?

RIs need to have excellent science – this is relatively easy to measure, i.e. how many users, how many scientific publications, citations etc. The indicators to measure innovation are more difficult to track in the short term. This requires patience. The added value created by the RI takes time to emerge because it is often decoupled from where the knowledge originated from and may appear in another sector after some time. Another aspect is the education of people and the creation of new skills for specific technologies that did not exist previously. These experts benefit local industry and improve the technical processes with their experiences and knowledge.

ELI can contribute to solving the problem from the scientific and technical point of view. This entails exploring research that will contribute to the Green Deal or the digital transition. On the other hand, RIs should try to reduce their ecological footprint for example by reducing energy consumption or collecting [FAIR] data on operations which can be studied to improve operations in the future.

The ELI name includes the word Light in its name. By light, we mean visible light, which is electromagnetic radiation. However, within the electromagnetic spectrum, in addition to visible light, we distinguish radio waves, microwave radiation, infrared radiation, ultraviolet radiation, X-rays and gamma rays. These differ in wavelength and frequency but are expressions of the same phenomenon. Similarly, technological and research infrastructure can be very different but they have a lot of common ground which can be exchanged on to learn from each other.

It [ELI ALPS] is a modern, futuristic building. I was impressed by the technology. I mentioned earlier that it is not enough to build a research centre, you have to operate it. In my view, this is a world-class facility that offers cutting-edge technology to its users. ELI is on the right track!


Photo: ELI ALPS/Gábor Balázs