The first stop on Chu's tour was NSLS-II. After being welcomed by Laboratory Director Sam Aronson, Chu talked with Associate Laboratory Director for Basic Energy Sciences Jim Misewich about Brookhaven's energy strategy and partnerships, ranging from the Smart Grid consortium to a recent collaboration with General Electric to study batteries in action using NSLS. Chu then heard from Associate Laboratory Director for Photon Sciences Steve Dierker about how NSLS-II will advance work in these fields and numerous others. While walking through pentant 1 - the first fifth of the NSLS-II ring building to finish installation of conventional facilities like walls, plumbing, and electricity - Dierker explained the machine's components, construction progress, and the wide-ranging beamlines under development.

Chu also made stops at the Relativistic Heavy Ion Collider's PHENIX detector and at the Ultrafast Laser Spectroscopy Laboratory in the Lab's Condensed Matter Physics and Materials Science Department before talking with a packed audience in Berkner Hall.