A unified user‐friendly instrument control and data acquisition system for the ornl sans instrument suite

Xingxing Yao; Blake Avery; Miljko Bobrek; Lisa Debeer‐schmitt; Xiaosong Geng; Ray Gregory; Greg Guyotte; Mike Harrington; Steven Hartman; Lilin He; Luke Heroux; Kay Kasemir; Rob Knudson; James Kohl; Carl Lionberger; Kenneth Littrell; Matthew Pearson; Sai Venkatesh Pingali; Cody Pratt; Shuo Qian; Mariano Ruiz‐rodriguez; Vladislav Sedov; Gary Taufer; Volker Urban; Klemen Vodopivec

doi:10.3390/app11031216

A unified user‐friendly instrument control and data acquisition system for the ornl sans instrument suite

Xingxing Yao, Blake Avery, Miljko Bobrek, Lisa Debeer‐schmitt, Xiaosong Geng, Ray Gregory, Greg Guyotte, Mike Harrington, Steven Hartman, Lilin He, Luke Heroux, Kay Kasemir, Rob Knudson, James Kohl, Carl Lionberger, Kenneth Littrell, Matthew Pearson, Sai Venkatesh Pingali, Cody Pratt, Shuo QianMariano Ruiz‐rodriguez, Vladislav Sedov, Gary Taufer, Volker Urban, Klemen Vodopivec

Research output: Contribution to journal › Article › peer-review

7 Scopus citations

Abstract

In an effort to upgrade and provide a unified and improved instrument control and data acquisition system for the Oak Ridge National Laboratory (ORNL) small‐angle neutron scattering (SANS) instrument suite—biological small‐angle neutron scattering instrument (Bio‐SANS), the ex-tended q‐range small‐angle neutron scattering diffractometer (EQ‐SANS), the general‐purpose small‐angle neutron scattering diffractometer (GP‐SANS)—beamline scientists and developers teamed up and worked closely together to design and develop a new system. We began with an in-depth analysis of user needs and requirements, covering all perspectives of control and data acquisition based on previous usage data and user feedback. Our design and implementation were guided by the principles from the latest user experience and design research and based on effective practices from our previous projects. In this article, we share details of our design process as well as prominent features of the new instrument control and data acquisition system. The new system provides a sophisticated Q‐Range Planner to help scientists and users plan and execute instrument configurations easily and efficiently. The system also provides different user operation interfaces, such as wizard‐type tool Panel Scan, a Scripting Tool based on Python Language, and Table Scan, all of which are tailored to different user needs. The new system further captures all the metadata to enable post‐experiment data reduction and possibly automatic reduction and provides users with enhanced live displays and additional feedback at the run time. We hope our results will serve as a good example for developing a user‐friendly instrument control and data acquisition system at large user facilities.

Original language	English
Article number	1216
Pages (from-to)	1-15
Number of pages	15
Journal	Applied Sciences (Switzerland)
Volume	11
Issue number	3
DOIs	https://doi.org/10.3390/app11031216
State	Published - Feb 1 2021

Funding

Funding: This research was funded by US DOE Office of Science. This research was funded by US DOE Office of Science. Acknowledgments: The authors thank all beamline teams and external users with whom we worked, database administrators Jeff Patton and Peter Parker, beamline scientists Changwoo Do, William T. Heller, Mark Lumsden, and all SPICE developers, all EPICS and CS‐Studio developers, and all previous and current developers in the SNS Instrument Data Acquisition and Controls group. This project used resources at HFIR and SNS, DOE Office of Science User Facilities oper‐ ated by ORNL. The Bio‐SANS instrument is supported by the DOE Office of Biological and Envi‐ ronmental Research.

Funders	Funder number
DOE Office of Biological and Envi‐ ronmental Research
DOE Office of Science
Office of Science

Keywords

Data acquisition
GUI
Instrument control
Neutron scattering
SANS
User facility

Access to Document

10.3390/app11031216

Cite this

Yao, X., Avery, B., Bobrek, M., Debeer‐schmitt, L., Geng, X., Gregory, R., Guyotte, G., Harrington, M., Hartman, S., He, L., Heroux, L., Kasemir, K., Knudson, R., Kohl, J., Lionberger, C., Littrell, K., Pearson, M., Pingali, S. V., Pratt, C., ... Vodopivec, K. (2021). A unified user‐friendly instrument control and data acquisition system for the ornl sans instrument suite. Applied Sciences (Switzerland), 11(3), 1-15. Article 1216. https://doi.org/10.3390/app11031216

@article{e46e9d82a6d14f0b8b8b62d090747cbf,

title = "A unified user‐friendly instrument control and data acquisition system for the ornl sans instrument suite",

abstract = "In an effort to upgrade and provide a unified and improved instrument control and data acquisition system for the Oak Ridge National Laboratory (ORNL) small‐angle neutron scattering (SANS) instrument suite—biological small‐angle neutron scattering instrument (Bio‐SANS), the ex-tended q‐range small‐angle neutron scattering diffractometer (EQ‐SANS), the general‐purpose small‐angle neutron scattering diffractometer (GP‐SANS)—beamline scientists and developers teamed up and worked closely together to design and develop a new system. We began with an in-depth analysis of user needs and requirements, covering all perspectives of control and data acquisition based on previous usage data and user feedback. Our design and implementation were guided by the principles from the latest user experience and design research and based on effective practices from our previous projects. In this article, we share details of our design process as well as prominent features of the new instrument control and data acquisition system. The new system provides a sophisticated Q‐Range Planner to help scientists and users plan and execute instrument configurations easily and efficiently. The system also provides different user operation interfaces, such as wizard‐type tool Panel Scan, a Scripting Tool based on Python Language, and Table Scan, all of which are tailored to different user needs. The new system further captures all the metadata to enable post‐experiment data reduction and possibly automatic reduction and provides users with enhanced live displays and additional feedback at the run time. We hope our results will serve as a good example for developing a user‐friendly instrument control and data acquisition system at large user facilities.",

keywords = "Data acquisition, GUI, Instrument control, Neutron scattering, SANS, User facility",

author = "Xingxing Yao and Blake Avery and Miljko Bobrek and Lisa Debeer‐schmitt and Xiaosong Geng and Ray Gregory and Greg Guyotte and Mike Harrington and Steven Hartman and Lilin He and Luke Heroux and Kay Kasemir and Rob Knudson and James Kohl and Carl Lionberger and Kenneth Littrell and Matthew Pearson and Pingali, {Sai Venkatesh} and Cody Pratt and Shuo Qian and Mariano Ruiz‐rodriguez and Vladislav Sedov and Gary Taufer and Volker Urban and Klemen Vodopivec",

note = "Publisher Copyright: {\textcopyright} 2021 by the authors. Licensee MDPI, Basel, Switzerland.",

year = "2021",

month = feb,

day = "1",

doi = "10.3390/app11031216",

language = "English",

volume = "11",

pages = "1--15",

journal = "Applied Sciences (Switzerland)",

issn = "2076-3417",

publisher = "MDPI",

number = "3",

}

Yao, X, Avery, B, Bobrek, M , Debeer‐schmitt, L , Geng, X , Gregory, R , Guyotte, G, Harrington, M, Hartman, S , He, L , Heroux, L , Kasemir, K , Knudson, R , Kohl, J, Lionberger, C, Littrell, K , Pearson, M , Pingali, SV, Pratt, C, Qian, S , Ruiz‐rodriguez, M , Sedov, V, Taufer, G, Urban, V & Vodopivec, K 2021, 'A unified user‐friendly instrument control and data acquisition system for the ornl sans instrument suite', Applied Sciences (Switzerland), vol. 11, no. 3, 1216, pp. 1-15. https://doi.org/10.3390/app11031216

TY - JOUR

T1 - A unified user‐friendly instrument control and data acquisition system for the ornl sans instrument suite

AU - Yao, Xingxing

AU - Avery, Blake

AU - Bobrek, Miljko

AU - Debeer‐schmitt, Lisa

AU - Geng, Xiaosong

AU - Gregory, Ray

AU - Guyotte, Greg

AU - Harrington, Mike

AU - Hartman, Steven

AU - He, Lilin

AU - Heroux, Luke

AU - Kasemir, Kay

AU - Knudson, Rob

AU - Kohl, James

AU - Lionberger, Carl

AU - Littrell, Kenneth

AU - Pearson, Matthew

AU - Pingali, Sai Venkatesh

AU - Pratt, Cody

AU - Qian, Shuo

AU - Ruiz‐rodriguez, Mariano

AU - Sedov, Vladislav

AU - Taufer, Gary

AU - Urban, Volker

AU - Vodopivec, Klemen

PY - 2021/2/1

Y1 - 2021/2/1

N2 - In an effort to upgrade and provide a unified and improved instrument control and data acquisition system for the Oak Ridge National Laboratory (ORNL) small‐angle neutron scattering (SANS) instrument suite—biological small‐angle neutron scattering instrument (Bio‐SANS), the ex-tended q‐range small‐angle neutron scattering diffractometer (EQ‐SANS), the general‐purpose small‐angle neutron scattering diffractometer (GP‐SANS)—beamline scientists and developers teamed up and worked closely together to design and develop a new system. We began with an in-depth analysis of user needs and requirements, covering all perspectives of control and data acquisition based on previous usage data and user feedback. Our design and implementation were guided by the principles from the latest user experience and design research and based on effective practices from our previous projects. In this article, we share details of our design process as well as prominent features of the new instrument control and data acquisition system. The new system provides a sophisticated Q‐Range Planner to help scientists and users plan and execute instrument configurations easily and efficiently. The system also provides different user operation interfaces, such as wizard‐type tool Panel Scan, a Scripting Tool based on Python Language, and Table Scan, all of which are tailored to different user needs. The new system further captures all the metadata to enable post‐experiment data reduction and possibly automatic reduction and provides users with enhanced live displays and additional feedback at the run time. We hope our results will serve as a good example for developing a user‐friendly instrument control and data acquisition system at large user facilities.

AB - In an effort to upgrade and provide a unified and improved instrument control and data acquisition system for the Oak Ridge National Laboratory (ORNL) small‐angle neutron scattering (SANS) instrument suite—biological small‐angle neutron scattering instrument (Bio‐SANS), the ex-tended q‐range small‐angle neutron scattering diffractometer (EQ‐SANS), the general‐purpose small‐angle neutron scattering diffractometer (GP‐SANS)—beamline scientists and developers teamed up and worked closely together to design and develop a new system. We began with an in-depth analysis of user needs and requirements, covering all perspectives of control and data acquisition based on previous usage data and user feedback. Our design and implementation were guided by the principles from the latest user experience and design research and based on effective practices from our previous projects. In this article, we share details of our design process as well as prominent features of the new instrument control and data acquisition system. The new system provides a sophisticated Q‐Range Planner to help scientists and users plan and execute instrument configurations easily and efficiently. The system also provides different user operation interfaces, such as wizard‐type tool Panel Scan, a Scripting Tool based on Python Language, and Table Scan, all of which are tailored to different user needs. The new system further captures all the metadata to enable post‐experiment data reduction and possibly automatic reduction and provides users with enhanced live displays and additional feedback at the run time. We hope our results will serve as a good example for developing a user‐friendly instrument control and data acquisition system at large user facilities.

KW - Data acquisition

KW - GUI

KW - Instrument control

KW - Neutron scattering

KW - SANS

KW - User facility

UR - http://www.scopus.com/inward/record.url?scp=85100216302&partnerID=8YFLogxK

U2 - 10.3390/app11031216

DO - 10.3390/app11031216

M3 - Article

AN - SCOPUS:85100216302

SN - 2076-3417

VL - 11

SP - 1

EP - 15

JO - Applied Sciences (Switzerland)

JF - Applied Sciences (Switzerland)

IS - 3

M1 - 1216

ER -

A unified user‐friendly instrument control and data acquisition system for the ornl sans instrument suite

Abstract

Funding

Keywords

Access to Document

Other files and links

Fingerprint

Cite this