Proposal Submission and Assessment Procedures

1. Submission procedure

(1) Announcement of call for proposals

MLF regularly calls the proposals shown below. When the acceptance period approaches, please check the URLs below for the announcement of the calls.

Access mode Acceptance of proposals URL for application guideline
General use proposal (short term) Twice a year
around May and October		 https://mlfinfo.jp/en/user/proposals/2020A/
General use proposal (long term) Once a year
Pre-application(mandatory):around January
Application: around February and March		 http://j-parc.jp/researcher/MatLife/en/applying/LTP.html
General use P-type proposal Twice a year
around May and October		 http://j-parc.jp/researcher/MatLife/en/applying/koubo.html
New user promotion proposal Twice a year
around May and October
Pre-application (at any time) and consultation are necessary.		 http://www.cross-tokai.jp/en/users/trial_use/

(2) Procedures for proposal application

Please submit proposals according to the following instructions, noting that procedures for proposal application differ by application type.

General use proposal (short term), P-type proposal

Applications should be submitted online through the J-PARC Proposal Submission System (https://jpms.j-parc.jp/j-pas/).

New user promotion proposal

Applications should be submitted online through the J-PARC Proposal Submission System (https://jpms.j-parc.jp/j-pas/). Pre-application is necessary via CROSShelp before the call for General use proposal (short term) is open. The detailed information is available on the official website below.
http://www.cross-tokai.jp/en/users/trial_use/

General use proposal (long term)

Applications should be submitted via email.
The detailed information is available in the application guidelines.

Operating suggestions for J-PARC Proposal Submission System (https://jpms.j-parc.jp/j-pas/)

  • If you are submitting a proposal for the first time, you need to register as a new user. Please access the system and register according to the guidance.
  • A submission acceptance e-mail is sent to you when the electronic application form has been successfully submitted. Please confirm your submission in the e-mail message.
  • Please confirm if your browser environment is supported at the top page of the J-PARC Proposal Submission System.

If you have any questions or your browser environment does not seem supported, please contact the J-PARC Center Users Office.

2. Proposal Review

Review system

All non-proprietary General use proposals are reviewed based on the Basic Policy for MLF Use. There are also sub-committees of the Neutron and Muon Science Proposal Review Committees to assess proposals from specialized viewpoints. A list of sub-committees can be seen below. Please choose the appropriate Sub-Committee when submitting your proposal.

Neutron Sub-committees Muon Sub-committees
P1 Structural Science (Crystal, Amorphous and Liquid) Q1 Electronic Properties of Matter & Hydrogen in Matter
P2 Energy Science and High-Pressure Science Q2 General Applications
P3 Soft Matter and Biological Matter  
P4 Magnetic Material and Strongly Correlated Electron System (Structure)  
P5 Magnetic Material and Strongly Correlated Electron System (Dynamics)  
P6 Fundamental Physics, Nuclear Physics, Instrumentation, Imaging  
P7 Industrial Application (*1)  
P8 Materials Engineering  
P9 New User Promotion (*2)  
Long Term Proposals  

(*1)
Principle Investigators wishing to apply for the Industrial Application (P7) review field must belong to private companies.
(*2)
Users who have previously applied for the new user promotion access system of CROSS are able to select the New Use Promotion (P9) review field.

Evaluation criteria

Submitted proposals are assessed and selected based on the following criteria:

1) General use proposal (short term), P-type proposal, New user promotion proposal

  • Scientific significance
  • Industrial applications
  • Social merit
  • Technical feasibility
  • Potential of research team for executing academic research
  • Relation to the overall research plan
  • Educational merit
  • Promotion of a new research field, encouragement for first-time user

2) General use proposal (one-year proposal)

Proposals that involve the development of experimental techniques are assessed on the following criteria.

  • Scientific significance
  • Industrial applications
  • Social merit
  • Technical feasibility
  • Potential of research team for executing academic research
  • Relation to the overall research plan
  • Educational merit
  • Promotion of a new research field, encouragement for first-time users

3) General use proposal (long term)

  • Appropriateness of the reason for long term strategy
  • Academic significance
  • Novelty and originality
  • Feasibility of the research plan
  • Research funding to support long term project
  • Potential of research team for executing academic research
  • Activity for dissemination of research outcomes
Safety review

Safety aspects of all proposals are reviewed by a safety review team from the Materials and Life Science Division of the J-PARC center.

Information of experiment sample(s)
Please provide chemical information on the experiment sample(s) in the application form.　A review of chemical and radiation safety is conducted by the J-PARC Center.

At present, the following rules apply for MLF:

  1. Powder samples must be sealed in a cell.
  2. Liquid samples and samples contained in a capillary with a solution/solvent must be checked by the J-PARC radiation control office for approval before use.

Users planning to use sample cells and/or capillaries are therefore requested to provide information on them so that the consultation process can proceed smoothly.

Review results

After the review, results and allocated beamtime are notified to applicants. Review results have three types as below.

Approved Proposals have received a beamtime allocation in the current proposal round.
Reserved Proposals have been approved in principle but have not received a beamtime allocation. Proposals are effectively ‘wait-listed’ pending beamtime becoming available due to cancellation or other circumstances. Should beamtime become available, a Beamline Scientist will make contact with you and, after consultation, decide the exact beamtime which shall be allocated to your proposal. There is no carry-over to the next proposal round if the proposal does not receive a beamtime allocation in the current operations period.
Not Approved Proposals have been judged to be unsuitable or were uncompetitive in the current proposal round and, thus, received no beamtime allocation.