Your abstract should fully describe the planned research or measurement in a concise manner (it's not necessary to reach the 4,000 character limit!).

Provide specific detail (samples, temperatures etc) so reviewers and beamline staff can assess the scientific and technical merit of your proposal.

In particular, the following points should be briefly addressed:

Identify samples to be studied (chemical names, formulas etc).

Describe the scientific or technical importance of the samples and proposed measurements.

Explain what you hope to learn and how that can be obtained from powder diffraction.

State why you feel high-resolution synchrotron powder diffraction is required.

Comment on how you expect information learnt from the measurements will be used (published journal article, student thesis, etc)

Standard proposals requesting more than 1 shift (non-rapid access) are typically more detailed than single (1) shift rapid access mail-in requests.