Characterization and performance evaluation of the XSPA-500k detector using synchrotron radiation.

Hybrid photon counting (HPC) detectors are widely used at both synchrotron facilities and in-house laboratories. The features of HPC detectors, such as no readout noise, high dynamic range, high frame rate, excellent point spread function, no blurring etc. along with fast data acquisition, provide a high-performance detector with a low detection limit and high sensitivity. Several HPC detector systems have been developed around the world. A number of them are commercially available and used in academia and industry. One of the important features of an HPC detector is a fast readout speed. Most HPC detectors can easily achieve over 1000 frames s-1, one or two orders of magnitude faster than conventional CCD detectors. Nevertheless, advanced scientific challenges require ever faster detectors in order to study dynamical phenomena in matter. The XSPA-500k detector can achieve 56 kframes s-1 continuously, without dead-time between frames. Using `burst mode', a special mode of the UFXC32k ASIC, the frame rate reaches 1 000 000 frames s-1. XSPA-500k was fully evaluated at the Metrology beamline at Synchrotron SOLEIL (France) and its readout speed was confirmed by tracking the synchrotron bunch time structure. The uniformity of response, modulation transfer function, linearity, energy resolution and other performance metrics were also verified either with fluorescence X-rays illuminating the full area of the detector or with the direct beam.

Use of the metals data file (CRYSTMET) in XAFS analysis.

The X-ray absorption spectrometry (XAS) technique has been widely used to determine the local structure of materials that are poorly suited to study by ordinary diffraction methods, such as fine particles or amorphous matter. XAS is among the major applications at synchrotron radiation facilities and many existing beamlines perform the measurement of XAFS (X-ray absorption fine structure) spectra. XAFS spectra can also be measured with conventional X-ray sources. Measurement of XAFS spectra is relatively straightforward, but real difficulties arise in the analysis and interpretation of the data. Contrary to single-crystal diffraction techniques, the structure is not obtained directly from the measured XAFS data. Model structures must be assumed and the corresponding simulated XAFS spectra must be calculated, with determination of which models best fit the measured data. Model building is a most important part of XAFS analysis, but creation of three-dimensional structures from crystal-chemical considerations can be a very time-consuming task. Utilization of a database of crystal structures and of its built-in structure analysis and display tools can considerably reduce the time and effort required by this task. As XAS is often used to study metals, a database of alloys and intermetallic compounds, such as CRYSTMET, incorporating an array of powerful tools, is then very useful.