Provision for a synchrotron radiation facility, to be incorporated into the storage ring project of the Deutsches Elektronen Synchrotron (DESY) at Hamburg, had been included in the revised Laboratory proposal of 1970, with the aim of making available an intense source of x-rays for diffraction experiments in molecular biology. It consisted of two "bunkers", the B-bunker later called Bunker II, to be built first, on the synchrotron, and the A-bunker later called Bunker IV, the larger of the two and the permanent outstation headquarters, on the storage ring. The DESY synchrotron had come into operation in 1964 and the double storage ring system (DORIS) was in use from 1974.

Much of the early correspondence is with K.C. Holmes, then Professor (later Director) of Biophysics at the Max-Planck-Institute for Medical Research, who supervised some of the preliminary research at DESY, acted as EMBL "Gruppenspracher" and as acting part-time head of the outstation until the appointment of H.B. Stuhrmann from October 1976.

A regular user of the DESY facility was H.E. Huxley who, among others, contributed memoranda and letters on its development and suggestions for changes or improvements.