Development of Software Framework for X-Ray Optics Simulation and Modeling

Improved optical simulations are critical for x-ray synchrotron radiation sources and free electron lasers. Such facilities generate x-ray pulses of extremely high spectral brightness and flux, high repetition rates and small transverse and longitudinal phase-space volumes. The radiation pulses are in many cases limited only by the basic laws of wave optics. The accelerator light source community has developed a set of validated numerical tools to study x-ray generation via spontaneous emission, self-amplified spontaneous emission and self-seeded FELs. However, the subsequent x-ray transport lines at billion dollar facilities are designed and modeled using approximate, incomplete or oversimplified algorithms. This project will improve the algorithms of existing software for designing x-ray beamlines at state-of- the-art light sources and next-generation facilities. We will also develop new algorithms and software for this purpose, incorporating them all within a friendly GUI-based framework known as RadTrack. This approach enables ease-of-use and interactivity with a growing number of other scientific and engineering applications. Commercial Applications and Other Benefit: Development of such a framework was given high priority by the Simulation and Modeling working group at the DOE workshop on x-ray optics for BES light source facilities of March, 2013. Our target customers include the National Synchrotron Light Source II, the Linac Coherent Light Source, the European X-ray Free Electron Laser and the proposed MaRIE XFEL project at Los Alamos. In addition to these large facilities, there are about a dozen proposed table-top facilities for x-ray generation via compton backscatter or FELs driven by compact ultra-bright electron accelerators. In the longer term, we will expand into the XUV lithography space, which will inevitably evolve into x-ray lithography.