X-ray micro-tomography at the Advanced Light Source and National Energy Research Scientific Computing Center (NERSC) "superfacility"

Dilworth (Dula) Parkinson
Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory
Advanced Light Source

Users of the X-ray micro-tomography beamline at the Advanced Light Source (ALS) are able to generate 3D micron-resolution images of a wide variety of samples, from earth science samples like meteorites and volcanic rocks, to materials like advanced ceramics and batteries, to biological samples like spiders, bones, and plants. Once a scan of a sample is launched, users interact with their data through web interfaces, including interfaces for search, transfer, processing, and visualization of data. These easy-to-use interfaces hide the significant complexity of a number of automated and semi-automated workflows which rely heavily on the National Energy Research Scientific Computing Center (NERSC), which allows advanced and computationally intensive processing to be applied to the data. I will describe these workflows. This coupling of experimental and computational facilities in a "superfacility" is essential to the future of experimental facilities.

Presentation (PDF File)

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