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    1st ISIS PSI Muon Groups Meetings

    → Europe/Zurich
    WBGB/019, WBBC/101/103/111 (PSI)

    WBGB/019, WBBC/101/103/111

    PSI
    CampusOverview.pdf
    Photo_ISIS-PSI-1stCollaborationMeeting.jpg
    Timetable.pdf
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    The minutes are still being finalised.

    Minutes of the 1st ISIS-PSI Muon Collaboration Meeting at PSI, July 21, 2026

    Participants:

    • ISIS (13): Peter Baker, Sayani Biswas (part time, online), Chandrasekaran Chendru (part time, online), Stephen Cottrell, Adrian Hillier, Leandro Liborio, James Lord, Alex Louat, Francis Pratt, Rhea Stewart, Mark Telling, John Wilkinson, Koji Yokoyama 
    • PSI (13): Edan Bainglass (CSD, part time), Issa Briki (part time), Zurab Guguchia, Thomas Hicken, Rustem Khasanov, Jonas Krieger, Maxime Lamotte, Hubertus Luetkens, Thomas Prokscha, Zaher Salman, Toni Shiroka, Andreas Suter, Xiao Zhao 

    Summary of opportunities for closer cooperation

    As a general remark (by Leandro Liborio): "We are developing the same tools too many times at different places". As a result of the meeting, there is an intention to improve this through better cooperation.

    •  analysis software musrfit/wimda, DFT, beam/instrument simulations
      • musrfit software in git repository; wimda delphi code would be good to share
      • different data formats are OK, but need proper documentation
      • modularity and flexibity are essential to plug in additional libraries and to be open for new developments and event-by-event data
      • simple access for users to analysis software is important, such as https://ada.stfc.ac.uk/, aiidalab, or https://musruser.psi.ch/ or nx access to analysis machines https://nx.psi.ch/; In future, the trend is likely to be towards web applications; ada provides virtual workspaces (Rocky Linux 8.1) with lots of software (G4Beamline, Matlab, Mathematica, wimda, musrfit, musrsim, jupyter, EVA, Mudirac, Quantum Espresso, root (older version, 6.20))
      • An online meeting should be organised in autumn 2026 to discuss the next steps, with Andreas, Francis, Johnny et al

     

    • mu- elemental analysis
      • EVA & MuDirac/MOCCA data bases are more or less the same; EVA available on the ada workspace at ISIS
      • There is an urgent need to discuss further cooperation so that we can continue the developments made so far together
      • An online meeting should be organised in autumn 2026 to discuss the next steps with Phil, Leandro, Michael Heiss, Xiao et al

     

    • Instrument developments
      • Digitisation of detector signals, event-by-event data taking
      • PSI:
        • currently SiPMs, NO digitisation of detector signals, VME discriminators (PSI development), CAEN TDC V1190/1290
        • replace by CAEN picoTDC, MuTRiG, or RFSoC?
        • development of vertex-reconstruced muSR (vx-muSR) using Si-Pixel detectors
      • ISIS:
        •  development of 1 GS/s 12-bit streaming digitizer for Super-MuSR, Nuclear Instruments NI DAQ121
      • Share experiences with different digitisation strategies. vx-muSR at pulsed facility?

     

    • Sample environments
      • Share experiences in ultra-low T cryostats, pressure/strain, pump-probe (RF-muSR, photo-muSR)

     

     

    • Expanding the community
      • Increasing visibility is a key issue. Several suggestions were put forward:
        • organisation of mini-colloquia at European conferences, science focused "What can muons do for ..."
        • APS meetings
        • a kind of online seminar, every 6 months 1/2 day? (there is the monthly muSR online seminar organized by Thomas Hicken)
        • Help ISMS to develop a strategy such as LENS, engage young people to join ISMS
        • early career prizes
        • joint PhDs?
      • But also some concerns: do we have sufficient capacity to grow?

     

    It was agreed to continue the in-person meetings once a year. The next meeting is due to take place at the end of March as part of the 40th anniversary celebrations of ISIS Muons.

     

    Notes to the presentations

    PSI overview

    ISIS overview

    analysis software mainly used:

    • wimda delphi
    • mantid (large project), not well matched to what we are doing at ISIS; stopped support for muons in 2020
    • musrfit
    • some software developed by groups, but aren't used by the community
    • the future: number of types and complexity experiments likely to increase
    • provide a library core software? We do not need a software which can do everything.
    • data format: common format probably not needed (depends on DAQ systems); they have to be properly documented.
    • musrfit
      • musrfit forum to share better information; just started
      • plotting: online tool available, but for offline there are different tools - there is no need to provide something like that
      • validation tools: validation scheme saved on zenodo
      • major overhaul during long shutdown to ROOT 7
      • establish a broader developer base
    • flexibility to plug in additional libraries is important
    • modularity is essential a lot for new developments (vx-uSR, for example), musrfit has this
    • vx-uSR: online define a region to generate histograms in musrRoot; offline one can do everything one wants to. 
    • access to analysis software. Cloud? There is a STFC server/web site ada where one can do analysis; 
    • we have only 4 facilities, how can we get things easier to use across facilities?
    • the future is likely to be web applications
    • use of ai tools: where will it go, how to use?
    • open source is essential to keep code alive
    • wish list NeXus/ISIS:
      • NeXus Definition Files: available via an open repo (e.g. zenodo). This would allow to track changes over time easily
      • Open access to some calibration files on a yearly base. Reason: this way it would be possible to cross-check NeXus definition versus real written files.

     

    AiiDAlab, DFT, MSCP (muon spectroscopy computational project)

    • quantum espresso, login through PSI account; everything goes through the web interface, workflow is saved
    • maintained by PSI center for scientific computing
    • skeptic about DFT use for the general user, it may take one week to get a result and calculation for various structures may not converge; needs an expert to check
    • MSCP now moved to AiiDAlab: using CASTEP & quantum espresso, pymuon, Muspinsim
    • "we are developing the same tools too many times at different places"; how can we improve that? Leandro in exchange with PSI people.

     

    mu- (online: Sayani, Chendur)

    • EVA
      • SRIM/TRIM included
      • G4beamline being included for stopping profiles
      • MuDirac data base
      •  
    • nuclear gamma ray analysis from PSI very interenting for both sides
    • PSI MuDirac/MOCCA data base.
    • EVA & MuDirac/MOCCA data bases are more or less same
    • need a meeting with Phil, Mike, Leandro et al
    • what's about higher transitions between n=10 to n=20; EVA considers n=10, in MuDirac/MOCCA up to n=20
    • using the same data analysis at both ISIS and PSI would be very beneficial

     

    mu- setups

    • liquid nitrogen systems to share
    • ISIS: 128 channel digitiser from CAEN; standalone 5560SEB, https://caen.it/subfamilies/14-bit-125-ms-s/
    • New ISIS instrument MuX
    • PSI: tracking of incoming muons, going towards tomography
    • tracking at a pulsed source would be also very interesting, but GEM probably do not work... tracking with Si.pixel detectors could work

     

    Beam modelling

    • musrSim will be available, if G4Beamline is not continued
    • experimental beam optimization

     

    e-learning

    • PSI e-learning for musrFit, muon spectroscopy school
    • Online learning at ISIS, e-learning.pan-training.eu, lmsweb.stfc.ac.uk;
    • costs, who are maintaining things?
    • MIXE training at muon spectroscopy school, would be good to have something similar for both facilities
    • links to PSI e-learning could be put the ISIS e-learning

     

    expanding the community

    • joint PhDs?
    • do we have the capacity to grow?
    • increase the visibility, APS meetings, European conferences
    • something like online seminar, but every 6 months 1/2 day or 1 day
    • early career prizes
    • help ISMS to develop a strategy, like LENS, thesis prize, engage youg people to join
    • News article about our meeting
    • engage early career people

     

    Which muon facility to use best for an experiment?

    • It may happen that users are not aware that their experiment might be better carried out at PSI or ISIS
    • One option to deal with this: during the submission process, users may select a tick box in the online form that they agree, that their proposal can be forwarded to the other facility for getting a first feedback from an instrument scientist to check, if it would be feasible to submit the proposal to the other facility.

     

     

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