Tribes of Science

Radio 4's Peter Curran came to Diamond Light Source to meet some of the scientists who work at and use the UK's synchrotron.

Physical Sciences Director Trevor Rayment introduces Peter to the facility and talks about the people who work at Diamond, "At their heart they're scientists and what drives them is the sheer excitement of wanting to do something new."

Principal Beamline Scientist for the Materials and Magnetism beamline (I16) Steve Collins (pictured above) shows Peter around and tells him what drew him into the world of physics and working at Diamond, "The opportunity to come here and build something from scratch. We've really started from the beginning and created something which is quite extraordinary."

Katherine McAuley, Principal Beamline Scientist on Macromolecular Crystallography beamline I03, talks about the excitement of working at Diamond and supporting other people's research. "Whereas before I was in the laboratory making proteins, now I'm looking at robots and how to make them faster. To me it's still research."

Peter also met other members of the I16 and I03 teams, and wraps things up with a comment from Steve on how the machine works, "It's distortions in time, distortions in space. It's really Star Trek stuff."

Listen to the programme on BBC iPlayer