[SA_Scat] Internship position at the ILL: Improving SANS data analysis software

[stephen.king at stfc.ac.uk]

Ref: LSS_2


The topic of this internship is situated between soft matter science and computer science. SANS produces large volumes of good-quality high-impact data. However, the publication of this data is sometimes slowed down by the lack of a suitable, straight-forward data fitting software program which is intuitive to use even for non-computer experts. The ILL SANS team has decided to adopt the SasView software, a program developed at NIST which is being used at more and more neutron centres. It is a living software which evolves rapidly and needs to be shaped to ILL needs. This internship will therefore involve work on adding new form factor models (at the request of ILL SANS scientists) to the software package and/or converting existing models to incorporate them in a new model library (SasModels), as well as tackling aspects of the data analysis of two-dimensional data. The latter is of importance for the PhD theses being undertaken within the group. The trainee will also work on improving the software interface.

Activities of the trainee:
* Analysis of data in order to understand the needs and implications of such data fitting
* Possible participation as an observer in one internal experiment on the instrument D11
* Implementation of missing models using python and C/ C+
* Interaction with both scientific and computing staff

Qualifications and experience:
The ideal candidate would be either a software engineer with a good knowledge of Python and C or C++ and a strong interest in scientific programming or a student in physics or chemistry with a strong interest in computer programming and a knowledge of Python and ideally also C or C++.

Level required: 4th year university studies in Physics or chemistry
Duration: 4 months maximum

Supervisor: Ralf Schweins e-mail: schweins(at)ill.eu<mailto:schweins at ill.eu> and Miguel Gonzalez, e-mail: gonzalezm(at)ill.eu<mailto:gonzalezm at ill.eu>