Software for positron annihilation

This page contains software for positron annihilation spectroscopy developed in the Positron annihilation group at The Charles University in Prague

Software for Digital Doppler broadening spectroscopy

A software collection representing a complete solution for digital measurement of Doppler broadening has been developed. This software is free and can be redistributed and/or modified under the terms of the GNU General Public License version 3.
The users are however kindly requested to cite the use of our codes in their works using the reference J. Čížek, M. Vlček, I. Procházka, Nuclear Instruments and Methods in Physics Research Section A, 623, 982-994 (2010) .

The Doppler broadening of annihilation photo-peak is measured by high purity germanium (HPGe) detectors, which provide excellent energy resolution. Description of the spectrometers for digital measurement of Doppler broadening and the approaches for analysis of sampled waveforms can be found in our paper:

J. Čížek. M. Vlček, I. Procházka, Digital spectrometer for coincidence measurement of Doppler broadening of positron annihilation radiation Nuclear Instruments and Methods in Physics Research Section A 623, 982-994 (2010)

The digital measurement of Doppler broadening can be performed in two modes:

  • semi-digital mode , where the pulses from charge sensitive pre-amplifiers of HPGe detectors are firstly shaped by pseudo-Gaussian filter in spectroscopy amplifiers in order to improve the signal-to-noise ratio and the signals from spectroscopy amplifiers are then sampled by digitizers;
  • pure-digital mode , where the pulses from charge sensitive pre-amplifiers of HPGe detectors are sampled directly.

The pure-digital mode enables to achieve the best energy resolution, while semi-digital configuration allows for a very efficient reduction of pulses damaged by pile-up or by ballistic deficit which leads to a spectrum of superior clarity. The semi-digital mode was successfully employed for precise measurement of positron annihilation-in-flight. Details are given in the paper:

J. Čížek. M. Vlček, I. Procházka, Investigation of positron annihilation-in-flight using a digital coincidence Doppler broadening spectrometer New Journal of Physics 14, 035005 (2011)

  • acquisition software for automated digital measurement of Doppler broadening using the Acqiris (Aglient Technologies) family of high speed digitizers.
    • documentation
    • Zip archive with C++ source code
    • The acquisition software enables a complete setting of digitizers and acquisition of waveforms.
    • Dacqn: program for acquisition in a mode with a single position of trigger (internal or external)
    • cDacqn: program for acquisition in a mode with two trigger levels switched during measurement
  • cmfit software for analysis of waveforms sampled in the semi-digital mode, i.e. pulses from HPGe detectors are firstly shaped by spectroscopy amplifiers and then sampled by digitizers.
    • documentation
    • Zip archive with C++ source code
    • The cmfit package includes the following programs:
    • sDCDB Gen : Generates synthetic data for testing purposes. These data can be used to verify functionality Cmfit program.
    • cmfit : Analyzes sampled waveforms, performs energy calibration, eliminates pulses with distorted shape using digital filters, creates 1D and 2D energy spectra
  • DCDB software collection for analysis of signals measured in the pure-digital mode, i.e. pulses from HPGe detectors are directly sampled by digitizers.
    • documentation
    • Zip archive with C++ source code
    • The DCDB package includes the following programs:
    • DCDB Gen : Generates synthetic data for testing purposes. These data can be used to verify functionality of DCDB MPI and DCDB Hist programs.
    • DCDB MPI : Analyzes raw pulses from detectors by fitting them with model function. Fitted parameters are stored in intermediate binary files read- able by DCDB Hist program.
    • DCDB Hist : Calibrates energy and generates 1D and 2D spectra from inter- mediate binary files created by DCDB MPI program.

Copyright (C) 2012  These programs are free software: you can redistribute them and/or modify them under the terms of the GNU General Public License version 3.
The users are however kindly requested to cite the use of our programs in their works using the reference J. Čížek. M. Vlček, I. Procházka, Nuclear Instruments and Methods in Physics Research Section A, 623, 982-994 (2010).