Speaker
Dr
Ricardo Ferraz Leal
(SNS)
Description
Neutron scattering is one of the most effective ways to obtain information on both, the structure and the dynamics of condensed matter. The Spallation Neutron Source (SNS) is an accelerator-based neutron source at the Oak Ridge National Laboratory (TN, USA). This facility provides the most intense pulsed neutron beams in the world for scientific research and industrial development. State-of-the-art experiment stations provide a variety of capabilities for researchers across a broad range of disciplines, such as physics, chemistry, materials science, and biology.
With great power comes… big data. The SNS neutron detectors produce raw data sets of considerable size. In order to find meaningful information, those data need to be fully treated, i.e., reduced and analyzed. With the increase of alternative browsing devices and the quasi permanently-available Internet connection, the paradigm of data treatment is changing. Data treatment is not seen as a sequence of independent procedures (E.g. Data collection, Reduction and Analysis) but as a unique integrated workflow connecting all the parties involved and enabling smooth flow of information between scientific applications and users.
The SNS is leveraging Neutron Sciences by providing a better, and unique, user experience to the hundreds of users that annually visit their facilities. A new Web Portal using Responsive Web Design provides an optimal viewing and interaction experience across a wide range of devices. Coupling Boostrap [1] with JavaScript, we present a clean and responsive web interface that is simple and elegant to navigate, high-performing and easy to maintain and contribute. The system uses multiple freely available plugins and libraries for the presentation layer (DataTables [2], Handsontable [3], etc..) and makes use of Django Framework [4] for the backend. The experimental data is retrieved through the data catalogue system ICAT [5]. The scientific code routines are part of the Mantid Framework [6] and run separately on a high performance cluster.
We present the project's general architecture and the latest development on the data analysis and visualization layer for Small Angle Neutron Scattering technique. This layer presents the reduction results to the user and allows data plotting and fitting. We are using Plotly [7] python offline module for visualization and MathJS [8] for curve fitting. This solution is cross-browser and cross-platform and provides a unique user experience.
References:
[1] http://getbootstrap.com/
[2] http://www.datatables.net/
[3] http://handsontable.com/
[4] http://www.djangoproject.com/
[5] http://pan-data.eu/ICAT
[6] http://www.mantidproject.org/
[7] https://plot.ly/python/
[8] http://mathjs.org/
Primary author
Dr
Ricardo Ferraz Leal
(SNS)
