Python as a tool for analyze X ray small angle scattering data

CRISTIÁN HUCK IRIART; LISANDRO GIOVANETTI

Campinas

Congreso; 25th Annual User Meeting LNLS/CNPEM (RAU); 2015

Laboratorio Nacional Luz Sincrotron

Small angle x- ray scattering (SAXS) analysis requires several numerical steps to be done, starting from data reduction to data interpretation (physical models, invariants calculations, etc). All of these steps must be done in order to squeeze the information obtained by [1]. In the last decade they began to appear few user friendly programs available which allow doing a full data analysis [2]. Nevertheless, some of those software packages are useful to analyze simple systems or to perform a set of predetermined routines for SAXS data analysis. Other programs let users to write new functions or adding in-house written plug-ins. Those types of packages allow a complete and flexible analysis of the experimental data but at the expense of learning a specific programming language. Python is a general purpose, high level programming language with a coding syntax very easy to learn and is not restricted only to scientific computation. Language features and a small set of core packages includes: NumPy (mathematical arrays), SciPy (linear algebra, differential equations, signal processing and more), SymPy (symbolic Mathematics), matplotlib (graph plotting), etc; turns Python intoa very popular programming choice in the scientific community [3]. The main aim of this contribution is to introduce Phyton to the general user and to show some of its capabilities applied to the particular case of SAXS data analysis including a full pixel GISAXS image analysis and a few tricks to speed up computer calculation.1] Glatter, O.; Kratky, O. ?Small Angle X-ray Scattering?, Academy Press, 1982 [2] see for example http://smallangle.org/content/software [3] Perkel, J.M. Nature, 2015, 518, 125-126