Component Manual for the Neutron Ray-Tracing Package McStas, version 3.8.6

3.1  The Source_simple McStas Component

A circular neutron source with flat energy spectrum and arbitrary flux

Identification

Description

The routine is a circular neutron source, which aims at a square target centered at the beam (in order to improve MC-acceptance rate). The angular divergence is then given by the dimensions of the target. The neutron energy is uniformly distributed between lambda0-dlambda and lambda0+dlambda or between E0-dE and E0+dE. The flux unit is specified in n/cm2/s/st/energy unit (meV or Å).

This component replaces Source_flat, Source_flat_lambda, Source_flux and Source_flux_lambda.

Example: Source_simple(radius=0.1, dist=2, focus_xw=.1, focus_yh=.1, E0=14, dE=2)

Input parameters

Parameters in boldface are required; the others are optional.

Name

Unit

Description

Default

radius

m

Radius of circle in (x,y,0) plane where neutrons are generated.

0.1

yheight

m

Height of rectangle in (x,y,0) plane where neutrons are generated.

0

xwidth

m

Width of rectangle in (x,y,0) plane where neutrons are generated.

0

dist

m

Distance to target along z axis.

0

focus_xw

m

Width of target

.045

focus_yh

m

Height of target

.12

E0

meV

Mean energy of neutrons.

0

dE

meV

Energy half spread of neutrons (flat or gaussian sigma).

0

lambda0

Å

Mean wavelength of neutrons.

0

dlambda

Å

Wavelength half spread of neutrons.

0

flux

1/(s*cm**2*st*energy unit)

flux per energy unit, Å or meV if flux=0, the source emits 1 in 4*PI whole space.

1

gauss

1

Gaussian (1) or Flat (0) energy/wavelength distribution

0

target_index

1

relative index of component to focus at, e.g. next is +1 this is used to compute ’dist’ automatically.

1

Links

A simple continuous source with a flat energy/wavelength spectrum

This component is a simple source with an energy distribution which is uniform in the range \(E_0 \pm dE\) (alternatively: a wavelength distribution in the range \(\lambda _0 \pm d\lambda \)). This component is not used for detailed time-of-flight simulations, so we put \(t=0\) for all neutron rays.

The initial neutron ray position is chosen randomly from within a circle of radius \(r_\textrm {s}\) in the \(z=0\) plane. This geometry is a fair approximation of a cylindrical cold/thermal source with the beam going out along the cylinder axis.

The initial neutron ray direction is focused onto a rectangular target of width \(w\), height \(h\), parallel to the \(xy\) plane placed at \((0,0,z_\textrm {foc})\).

The initial weight of the created neutron ray, \(p_0\), is set to the energy-integrated flux, \(\Psi \), times the source area, \(\pi r_\textrm {s}^2\) times a solid-angle factor, which is basically the solid angle of the focusing rectangle. See also the section 3.0.1 on source flux.

This component replaces the obsolete components Source_flux_lambda, Source_flat, Source_flat_lambda, and Source_flux.