Ana Maria Guisao Betancur wins best talk prize at the Cockcroft Institute Post-Graduate Conference 2025

On Wednesday 15th October, the Cockcroft Institute Post-Graduate Researcher Conference 2025 was held at Daresbury Laboratory. The event gave researchers across the institute the opportunity to present their work through talks and posters covering a wide range of accelerator science topics, from radiobiology and femtosecond scale beam diagnostics to the UK XFEL and bright THz radiation. EuPRAXIA Doctoral Network Fellow Ana Maria Guisao-Betancur who is based at the Cockcroft Institute, gave a talk at the conference, which went on to be awarded the Best Talk Prize.

Ana Maria Guisao-Betancur (left) was awarded Best Talk Prize at the Cockcroft Institute Post-Graduate Conference 2025.

Through her talk, entitled “Single-shot electron bunch profile monitor based on coherent transition radiation imaging,” Ana shared an overview of the design and current development status of a single-shot bunch length monitor prototype. The prototype utilizes a broadband spatial imaging system for coherent transition radiation (CTR) and has recently been installed at the MAX IV Short Pulse Facility (SPF). The discussion was centred on the preliminary results to date, in which image features of the CTR images have been used to study changes in the bunch length, with reference measurements provided by a transverse deflecting cavity.

Ana said “the conference was a great space to connect with the rest of the students working on different projects across the institute’s universities through their talks and posters, and an opportunity to chat with postdocs and other academics, resulting in interesting discussions. We also had a good time at the end of the day, eating pizza during the social event and trying an escape room in town.”

For more information on the conference, you can visit the Indico page.

Congratulations to Ana!