Role

The Technical Beamline Support Group (TBS) is in charge of providing support, facilities and development capabilities in all areas relevant to instrumentation, data collection and data analysis on beamlines. Moreover, it liases the beamline instrument and operation development to the ESRF support structures. The TBS is composed of the Instrument Support Group, the Sample Environment Support Service, the ID06 Beamline, the Special Engineering Service, the Mechanics Service, the Scientific Software Service, the Beamline Instrumentation Support Service, the Chemistry and Micromanipulation Laboratory and the Surface Science Laboratory. The activities comprise detector engineering, development of control electronics and software, the operation of loan pools for detectors, electronics and mechanical components as well as sample environment support service together with corresponding laboratories, and the maintenance and development of scientific software. The Technical Beamline Support Group coordinates the services provided to the Experiments Division by the Technical Services and Computing Services Divisions.

Structure

The TBS is structured as follows (see organigram):

1. Instrument Support Group: ISG
   • Detector Engineering
   • Detector Electronics
   • Control Electronics: Electronic Pool, Detector Pool
     
     
2. Engineering Service
   
   
3. Scientific Software
   
   
4. Beamline Instrument Software Support: BLISS
   
   
5. Sample Environment Support Service
   
   
6. ID06
   

and the laboratories

1. Chemistry and Microimaging Laboratory
   
   
2. Surface Science Laboratory

Instrument Support

The Instrument Support Group: ISG provides hardware support to the ESRF beamlines in the areas of electronics, detectors and control equipment. Support is given for the day-to-day operation of the beamlines, installation of new equipment, interventions, preventive and corrective maintenance. The ISG also works on new projects, either for specific beamlines or for general purpose. Whenever relevant the support is organised and coordinated with members from Technical Services and Computing Services.

• Detector Engineering

The Detector Engineering Unit provides consulting, support and development in the area of X-Ray detectors engineering. It strongly liases with the Detector Electronics and Control Electronics units for the realisation of R&D projects.

• Detector Electronics

The Detector Electronics Unit provides consulting, support and development in the area of X-Ray detectors electronics. It strongly liases with the Detector Engineering and Control Electronics units for the realisation of R&D projects.

• Control Electronics

The Control Electronics Unit provides support and development for the electronics needed for instrument control on the beamlines. This also includes electronics for detectors.

Electronics Pool

The Electronic Pool maintains a stock of electronic instrumentation for loan service to ESRF and CRG beamlines.

Detector Pool

The Detector Pool maintains a stock of detectors and detector specific electronics. The Detector Pool runs a loan service for ESRF and CRG beamlines.

Engineering Service

The Engineering Service provides hardware support to the ESRF beamlines in the area of mechanics with special emphasis on stability and precise positioning of samples and optical elements. It also supports the other services of the TBS whenever mechanical issues are relevant. It liaises with the other relevant groups and services of the ESRF in order to offer a coordinated action to the beamlines.

Scientific Software

The Scientific Software Service is in charge of maintaining and developing scientific software for the ESRF. The functions span from the development of long-term projects to day-to-day consulting and troubleshooting. The group maintains and develops, in the limits of available staff, the software packages necessary for data processing. Special programs, such as Beam Focusing, on-line data reduction or automated PX data processing are also developed here in collaboration with other services.

Beamline Instrument Software Support: BLISS

The BLISS is in charge of the control software at ESRF beamlines. Its main task is to develop and maintain applications for data acquisition and control. The BLISS correspondent ensures that the computer equipment of the beamlines assigned to him operates correctly and liases with Computing Services regarding all infrastructure or system-administration related issues.

Sample Environment Support Service

The Sample Environment Support Service gives general support for performing experiments under non-ambient conditions; this includes high and low temperatures, high pressures and magnetic fields. The support consists of designing, mounting and testing new dedicated equipment, maintaining and modifying existing equipment, and helping the scientists with procurement and operation of state of the art sample environment apparatus. In addition the service runs a loan pool of equipment.

ID06

The ID06 beamline provides infrastructure for performing test of instrumentation in real conditions and it is open to collaborative efforts with other facilities. The end station can also be used for scientific test experiments.

Chemistry and Microimaging Laboratory

The Chemistry and Microimaging Laboratory provides analytical services and chemical preparation facilities for internal and external users. The laboratory is equipped with standard chemical instrumentation, Scanning Electron Microscopes, micromanipulators and sample micropreparation equipment.

Surface Science Laboratory

The Surface Science Laboratory focuses on the use of Atomic Force Microscopy for supplementing X-ray techniques in issues relevant to nanoscience. At the core of a European project called X-Tip, it coordinates a wide effort aimed to joint in a unique instrument the features of X-ray spectroscopies and Local Probe Microscopies. Through the use of Local Probes and fast feedback techniques it also looks into the possibility of devising and developing technologies for locating, “feeling” and steadily positioning samples under X-rays in the sub-micron regime.