On-the-Fly Scans for Fast Tomography at LNLS Imaging Beamline

As we go to brighter light sources and time resolved experiments, different approaches for executing faster scans in synchrotrons are an ever-present need. In many light sources, performing scans through a sequence of hardware triggers is the most commonly used method for synchronizing instruments and motors. Thus, in order to provide a sufficiently flexible and robust solution, the X-Ray Imaging Beamline (IMX) at the Brazilian Synchrotron Light Source [1] upgraded its scanning system to a NI PXI chassis interfacing with Galil motion controllers and EPICS environment. It currently executes point-to-point and on-the-fly scans controlled by hardware signals, fully integrated with the beamline control system under EPICS channel access protocol. Some approaches can use CS-Studio screens and automated Python scripts to create a user-friendly interface. All programming languages used in the project are easy to use and to learn, which allows high maintainability for the system delivered. The use of LNLS Hyppie platform [2, 3] also enables software modularity for better compatibility and scalability over different experimental setups and even different beamlines.