Developer(s) | DTU, ILL, KU |
---|---|
Stable release | 2.5 |
Repository | |
Written in | C, Perl [ citation needed ] |
Type | Monte Carlo Simulation |
License | GNU Lesser General Public License |
Website | mcstas |
McStas [1] [2] is free and open-source (GNU General Public License) software simulator for neutron scattering experiments. McStas is an abbreviation for Monte carlo Simulation of triple axis spectrometers, but the software can be used to simulate all types of neutron scattering instruments. The software is based on both Monte Carlo methods and ray tracing. A special compiler translates a domain-specific language describing the neutron instrument geometry and component definitions (written in C) to a stand-alone C code.
The basics of McStas was written in 1997 at Risø for simulation of their neutron experiments, that were based at the DR3 reactor that was shut down in year 2000. After the fusion of Risø with the Technical University of Denmark, McStas is currently developed at the Physics department of DTU and Institut Laue-Langevin, with involvement from the Niels Bohr Institute and Paul Scherrer Institute. The Copenhagen-based Data Management and Software Centre of the European Spallation Source is also expected to become a partner since many of the future instruments are being simulated using McStas.
McXtrace, an equivalent simulation package using X-rays instead of neutrons, started being developed in 2009 and it is now freely available.
Official partner sites are
The Niels Bohr Institute is a research institute of the University of Copenhagen. The research of the institute spans astronomy, geophysics, nanotechnology, particle physics, quantum mechanics, and biophysics.
The Technical University of Denmark, often simply referred to as DTU, is a polytechnic university and school of engineering. It was founded in 1829 at the initiative of Hans Christian Ørsted as Denmark's first polytechnic, and it is today ranked among Europe's leading engineering institutions. It is located in the town Kongens Lyngby, 12 kilometres (7.5 mi) north of central Copenhagen, Denmark.
The Institut Laue–Langevin (ILL) is an internationally financed scientific facility, situated on the Polygone Scientifique in Grenoble, France. It is one of the world centres for research using neutrons. Founded in 1967 and honouring the physicists Max von Laue and Paul Langevin, the ILL provides one of the most intense neutron sources in the world and the most intense continuous neutron flux in the world in the moderator region: 1.5×1015 neutrons per second per cm2, with a thermal power of typically 58.3 MW.
George Charles de Hevesy was a Hungarian radiochemist and Nobel Prize in Chemistry laureate, recognized in 1943 for his key role in the development of radioactive tracers to study chemical processes such as in the metabolism of animals. He also co-discovered the element hafnium.
Neutron scattering, the irregular dispersal of free neutrons by matter, can refer to either the naturally occurring physical process itself or to the man-made experimental techniques that use the natural process for investigating materials. The natural/physical phenomenon is of elemental importance in nuclear engineering and the nuclear sciences. Regarding the experimental technique, understanding and manipulating neutron scattering is fundamental to the applications used in crystallography, physics, physical chemistry, biophysics, and materials research.
Spallation is a process in which fragments of material (spall) are ejected from a body due to impact or stress. In the context of impact mechanics it describes ejection of material from a target during impact by a projectile. In planetary physics, spallation describes meteoritic impacts on a planetary surface and the effects of stellar winds and cosmic rays on planetary atmospheres and surfaces. In the context of mining or geology, spallation can refer to pieces of rock breaking off a rock face due to the internal stresses in the rock; it commonly occurs on mine shaft walls. In the context of anthropology, spallation is a process used to make stone tools such as arrowheads by knapping. In nuclear physics, spallation is the process in which a heavy nucleus emits numerous nucleons as a result of being hit by a high-energy particle, thus greatly reducing its atomic weight. In industrial processes and bioprocessing the loss of tubing material due to the repeated flexing of the tubing within a peristaltic pump is termed spallation.
Léon Nicolas Brillouin was a French physicist. He made contributions to quantum mechanics, radio wave propagation in the atmosphere, solid-state physics, and information theory.
Neutron backscattering is one of several inelastic neutron scattering techniques. Backscattering from monochromator and analyzer crystals is used to achieve an energy resolution on the order of a microelectronvolt (μeV). Neutron backscattering experiments are performed to study atomic or molecular motion on a nanosecond time scale.
In neutron time-of-flight scattering, a form of inelastic neutron scattering, the initial position and velocity of a pulse of neutrons is fixed, and their final position and the time after the pulse that the neutrons are detected are measured. By the principle of conservation of momentum, these pairs of coordinates may be transformed into momenta and energies for the neutrons, and the experimentalist may use this information to calculate the momentum and energy transferred to the sample. Inverse geometry spectrometers are also possible. In this case, the final position and velocity are fixed, and the incident coordinates varied.
The neutron electric dipole moment (nEDM), denoted dn, is a measure for the distribution of positive and negative charge inside the neutron. A nonzero electric dipole moment can only exist if the centers of the negative and positive charge distribution inside the particle do not coincide. So far, no neutron EDM has been found. The current best measured limit for dn is (0.0±1.1)×10−26 e⋅cm.
Heinz Maier-Leibnitz was a German physicist. He made contributions to nuclear spectroscopy, coincidence measurement techniques, radioactive tracers for biochemistry and medicine, and neutron optics. He was an influential educator and an advisor to the Federal Republic of Germany on nuclear programs.
A neutron research facility is most commonly a big laboratory operating a large-scale neutron source that provides thermal neutrons to a suite of research instruments. The neutron source usually is a research reactor or a spallation source. In some cases, a smaller facility will provide high energy neutrons using existing neutron generator technologies.
McXtrace is an open source software package for performing Monte Carlo simulations of X-ray scattering experiments. While its chief objective is to aid in the optimization of beamlines at e.g. synchrotrons, it may also be used for data analysis and at laboratory sources and beamlines. McXtrace is free software released under the GNU GPL.
The Virtual Instrumentation Tool for the ESS (VITESS) is an open source software package for the simulation of neutron scattering experiments. The software is maintained and developed by the Helmholtz-Zentrum Berlin für Materialien und Energie (HZB), the former Hahn-Meitner-Institur HMI, and available for Windows, Linux and Macintosh on the VITESS homepage. It is widely used for simulation of existing neutron scattering instruments as well as for the development of new instruments.
John M. "Jack" Carpenter was an American nuclear engineer known as the originator of the technique for utilizing accelerator-induced intense pulses of neutrons for research and developing the first spallation slow neutron source based on a proton synchrotron, the Intense Pulsed Neutron Source (IPNS). He died on 10 March 2020.
Neutrons are spin 1/2 particles that interact with magnetic induction fields via the Zeeman interaction. This interaction is both rather large and simple to describe. Several neutron scattering techniques have been developed to use thermal neutrons to characterize magnetic micro and nanostructures.
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The Journal of Neutron Research is a peer-reviewed scientific journal published by IOS Press. It was established in 1993 and covers research on Neutron scattering and its applications. It publishes original research papers of an experimental and theoretical nature in three areas of specialisation:
Penelope Jane Brown is a neutron crystallographer and served as Senior Scientist at the Institut Laue–Langevin until 2012. In 2002 she was the first woman to win the Institute of Physics Michael Faraday Medal.
Klaus-Dieter Liss, German: Liß, is a German-Australian physicist working in the field of experimental X-ray and neutron scattering and their applications. Liss research is on in-situ and real-time experiments with synchrotron and neutron radiation for the characterization of thermo-mechanical processes in metals; the investigation of phase transformations; the evolution of microstructures; and the kinetics of defects. His experimental achievements are the development of the Materials oscilloscope and the realization of the X-ray photon storage.