Hardware
Timing Systems & Synchronisation
Paper Title Page
THMBCMO22 Towards Defining a Synchronization Standard Between Beamline Components and Synchrotron Accelerators 1242
 
  • J.A. Avila-Abellan, X. Serra-Gallifa
    ALBA-CELLS, Cerdanyola del Vallès, Spain
  • T.M. Cobb
    DLS, Oxfordshire, United Kingdom
  • R. Hino
    ESRF, Grenoble, France
  • O.H. Seeck
    DESY, Hamburg, Germany
  • S. Zhang
    SOLEIL, Gif-sur-Yvette, France
 
  Funding: LEAPS-INNOV project has received funding from the European Union’s Horizon 2020 research and innovation program under Grant Agreement No 101004728
Standardization is a magic word in the electronics engineering jargon. Under its umbrella, it is generated the utopia of transparent integration with the rest of the parts with minimal extra effort for the software integration. But the experimental setup in a synchrotron beamline presents multiple challenges: it is highly dynamic and diverse. In the frame of LEAPS-INNOV project (*), the Task 3 of Work Package 5 aims to define a standard for synchronization in the beamline sample environment. Their partners (ALBA, DESY, DLS, ESRF and SOLEIL) have already reached a common vision of synchronization requirements. This paper first details the participants’ actual synchronization needs on their facilities. Next, the requirements foreseen for the future are outlined in terms of interfaces, time constraints and compatibility with timing systems. To conclude, we summarize the current state of the project: the hardware interfaces and the hardware platform definition. They both have been decided considering long-term availability, use of standard sub-components, and keeping the compromise between cost, development time, maintenance, reliability, flexibility and performance. This hardware architecture proposal meets the identified requirements. In the future, under the scope of LEAPS-INNOV, a demonstrator will be built, and we will work with the industry for its future commercialization.
 
slides icon Slides THMBCMO22 [1.592 MB]  
poster icon Poster THMBCMO22 [0.760 MB]  
DOI • reference for this paper ※ doi:10.18429/JACoW-ICALEPCS2023-THMBCMO22  
About • Received ※ 06 October 2023 — Revised ※ 11 October 2023 — Accepted ※ 11 December 2023 — Issued ※ 19 December 2023
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THMBCMO23 Development of a New Timing System for ISIS 1247
 
  • R.A. Washington
    STFC/RAL/ISIS, Chilton, Didcot, Oxon, United Kingdom
 
  The timing system at the ISIS Neutron and Muon source has been operating in its current iteration since 2008. Machine timing is handled by the Central Timing Distributor (CTD) which transmits various timing signals to ISIS accelerator equipment over RS-422 compliant timing buses. The nature of these timing signals has not changed since ISIS first delivered neutrons in 1984, and this paper will look at how an event-based timing system can be employed in the next generation of timing system for ISIS. A new timing system should allow for the distribution of events, triggers and timestamps, provide an increase in timing resolution and be fully backwards compatible with the current timing frame. The new Digitised Waveform System (DWS) at ISIS supports White Rabbit (WR). There is an available WR network which can be used to investigate a new timing system based on WR technology. Conclusions will be drawn from installing this new system in parallel with the current timing system; a comparison between the systems, alternatives, and next steps will be discussed.  
slides icon Slides THMBCMO23 [0.798 MB]  
DOI • reference for this paper ※ doi:10.18429/JACoW-ICALEPCS2023-THMBCMO23  
About • Received ※ 05 October 2023 — Revised ※ 10 October 2023 — Accepted ※ 13 December 2023 — Issued ※ 17 December 2023
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THMBCMO24 Time Synchronization and Timestamping for the ESS Neutron Instruments 1250
 
  • N. Holmberg, T. Brys, T. Bögershausen, M. Olsson, J.E. Petersson, A. Pettersson, T.S. Richter, F. Rojas
    ESS, Lund, Sweden
 
  Funding: Tillväxtverket (Sweden) & European Union
The European Spallation Source (ESS) will be a cutting-edge research facility that uses neutrons to study the properties of materials. This paper presents the timestamping strategy employed in the neutron instruments of the ESS, to enable efficient data correlation across subsystems and between different sources of experiment data. ESS uses absolute timestamps for all data and a global source clock to synchronize and timestamp data at the lowest appropriate level from each subsystem. This way we control the impact of jitter, delays and latencies when transferring experiment data to the data storage. ESS utilizes three time synchronisation technologies. The Network Time Protocol (NTP) providing an expected accuracy of approximately 10 milliseconds, the Precision Time Protocol (PTP) delivering roughly 10 microsecond accuracy, and hardware timing using Microreseach Finland (MRF) Event Receivers (EVR) which can reach 10 nanoseconds of accuracy. Both NTP and PTP rely on network communication using common internet protocols, while the EVRs use physical input and output signals combined with timestamp latching in hardware. The selection of the timestamping technology for each device and subsystem is based on their timestamp accuracy requirements, available interfaces, and cost requirements. This paper describes the choice of method used for different device types, like neutron choppers, detectors or sample environment equipment and covers some details of the implementation and characterisation.
 
slides icon Slides THMBCMO24 [0.384 MB]  
DOI • reference for this paper ※ doi:10.18429/JACoW-ICALEPCS2023-THMBCMO24  
About • Received ※ 06 October 2023 — Accepted ※ 11 December 2023 — Issued ※ 13 December 2023  
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THPDP012 Evolution of the Laser Megajoule Timing System 1312
 
  • T. Somerlinck
    CEA, LE BARP cedex, France
  • S. Hocquet, D. Monnier-Bourdin
    Greenfield Technology, Massy, France
 
  The Laser MegaJoule (LMJ), a 176-beam laser facility developed by CEA, is located at the CEA CESTA site near Bordeaux. The LMJ facility is part of the French Simulation Program, which combines improvement of theoretical models and data used in various fields of physics, high performance numerical simulations and experimental validation. It is designed to deliver about 1.4 MJ of energy on targets, for high energy density physics experiments, including fusion experiments. With 120 operational beams at the end of 2023, operational capabilities are gradually increasing until the full completion of the LMJ facility by 2025. To verify the synchronization of the precise delay generators, used on each bundle, a new timing diagnostic has been designed to observe the 1w and 3w fiducial signals. Meanwhile, due to electronic obsolescence, a new modified prototype precise of a delay generator, with ’new and old channels’, has been tested and compared. In this paper, a review of the LMJ synchronization report is given with a description of the first timing diagnostic as well as an overview of the LMJ delay generator obsolescence update. It also presents some leads for a future timing system.
LMJ: Laser MegaJoule
CEA: Commissariat à l’Energie Atomique et aux Energies Alternatives
 
poster icon Poster THPDP012 [3.535 MB]  
DOI • reference for this paper ※ doi:10.18429/JACoW-ICALEPCS2023-THPDP012  
About • Received ※ 10 October 2023 — Revised ※ 14 November 2023 — Accepted ※ 19 December 2023 — Issued ※ 21 December 2023
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THPDP018 The Timing System for PETRA IV 1335
 
  • T. Wilksen, V. Andrei, K. Brede, H.T. Duhme, M. Fenner, U. Hurdelbrink, J.M. Jäger, H. Kay, H. Lippek, F. Ludwig, M. Pawelzik, S. Ruzin, H. Schlarb
    DESY, Hamburg, Germany
 
  At DESY, the PETRA III synchrotron light source upgrade towards a fourth-generation, low-emittance machine PETRA IV is being pursued. The realisation of the new machine requires a complete redesign of the timing system, as the beam quality and beam control requirements will change significantly. The new timing system must generate and distribute facility-wide precise clocks, trigger signals, trigger events and beam-synchronous information. The design of the main hardware components will be based on the MTCA.4 standard, which has become a well-established platform at DESY and successfully been in use with DESY FEL’s MTCA.4-based timing systems for almost a decade now. This paper presents and discusses the PETRA IV timing system overall concept and functionality and its hardware components development status.  
poster icon Poster THPDP018 [1.259 MB]  
DOI • reference for this paper ※ doi:10.18429/JACoW-ICALEPCS2023-THPDP018  
About • Received ※ 04 October 2023 — Revised ※ 12 October 2023 — Accepted ※ 16 October 2023 — Issued ※ 26 October 2023
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THPDP031 Development of Beam Gate System Using the White Rabbit at SuperKEKB 1381
 
  • F. Ito, H. Kaji
    KEK, Ibaraki, Japan
  • Y. Iitsuka
    EJIT, Hitachi, Ibaraki, Japan
 
  Currently, SuperKEK has network-based systems such as trigger delivery, bucket selection, abort system, beam permission, and distributed DAQ, all of which are operated as separate systems. The White Rabbit (WR) has extraordinary multi-functionality when combined with the modules already developed, so it is possible that in the future all systems could be operated in a WR network. This would lead to a reduction in human, time, and financial costs. We constructed a beam gate, which is a part of the beam permission system, on a trial basis using WR. These trigger deliveries need to be interlocked. The trigger delivery to the electron gun has a specification that the next trigger delivery is turned ON/OFF after receiving the ON/OFF signal at any given timing. For the above reasons, the delay time from the receipt of the ON/OFF signal from the electron gun is not a fixed value, making it difficult to interlock with the trigger delivery of other devices. By turning on/off the trigger delivery using a precisely time-synchronized WR, the ON/OFF of the trigger delivery of all devices could be correctly interlocked.  
poster icon Poster THPDP031 [0.529 MB]  
DOI • reference for this paper ※ doi:10.18429/JACoW-ICALEPCS2023-THPDP031  
About • Received ※ 09 October 2023 — Revised ※ 10 October 2023 — Accepted ※ 18 December 2023 — Issued ※ 18 December 2023
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THPDP035
Implementation of Synchronization Control Device for Fly-scan at Hefei Light Source  
 
  • L.G. Chen
    USTC/NSRL, Hefei, Anhui, People’s Republic of China
 
  In the field of synchrotron beamline station control, especially in the scanning experimental data acquisition application, the synchronization performance of the scanning execution device and the data acquisition device is one of the key factors related to the quality of the scanning data and the efficiency of the experiment. The traditional experimental beamline station scanning synchronization control generally adopts a software processing mode, which results in a long scanning time, low scanning efficiency, and poor synchronization accuracy due to the existence of a large amount of dead zone time. Since March 2022, we have upgraded the original motion control system on the XMCD beamline station of the Hefei Light Source and improved the design of PANDABOX. At the same time, we have used the control framework of Bluesky to achieve the first energy fly-scan experiment at the Hefei Light Source. Experimental tests have shown that compared with step scan method, the experiment data quality of the energy fly-scan experiment is better, the scanning efficiency is higher, and the synchronization accuracy is higher. This provides useful reference for the technological development of the control field of the beamline station in the upcoming Hefei Advanced Light Source.  
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THPDP057 SPS Beam Dump Enhancements on Tracking and Synchronization 1444
 
  • N. Voumard, N. Magnin, P. Van Trappen
    European Organization for Nuclear Research (CERN), Geneva, Switzerland
 
  During Long Shutdown 2 (LS2) at CERN, the SPS Beam Dumping System (SBDS) was completely renovated and relocated to SPS Point 5. This allowed to deploy at the SPS the Beam Energy Tracking System (BETS) and the Trigger Synchronization Unit (TSU), initially designed for and operational at the LHC Beam Dumping System (LBDS). The challenge encountered in this migration was the dynamic multi-cycle operation scheme with fast ramping cycles of the SPS in comparison to the long physics periods at stable energy of the LHC. This paper describes the modification of both BETS and TSU systems as well as the automatic arming sequence put in place, including the interactions with the SPS injection, the beam revolution frequency, and the Beam Interlock System (BIS).  
poster icon Poster THPDP057 [0.490 MB]  
DOI • reference for this paper ※ doi:10.18429/JACoW-ICALEPCS2023-THPDP057  
About • Received ※ 05 October 2023 — Revised ※ 26 October 2023 — Accepted ※ 08 December 2023 — Issued ※ 12 December 2023
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THPDP085 LANSCE’s Timing System Status and Future Plans 1547
 
  • L.E. Walker, B.C. Atencio, S.A. Baily, D. Fratantonio, C.D. Hatch, M. Pieck, T. Ramakrishnan
    LANL, Los Alamos, New Mexico, USA
 
  Funding: This work was supported by the U.S. DOE through the Los Alamos National Laboratory (LANL). LANL is operated by Triad National Security, LLC, for the NNSA of U.S. DOE - Contract No. 89233218CNA000001
The Los Alamos Neutron Science Center (LANSCE) operates at a maximum repetition rate of 120 Hz. Timing gates are required for synchronization of the accelerator to provide beam acceleration along the LINAC and beam distribution to the five experimental areas. They are also provided to other devices with sensitive operating points relative to the machine cycle. Over the last 50 years of operations many new time sensitive pieces of equipment have been added. This has changed the demand on, and complexity of, the timing system. Further driven by equipment obsolescence issues, the timing system un-derwent many upgrades and revitalization efforts, with the most significant deployment starting in 2016. Due to these upgrade efforts, the timing system architecture design changed from a purely centralized system, to a distributed event-based one. The purpose of this paper is to detail the current state of the timing system, as a hy-brid system with the gate events being generated from a new timing master system, while still utilizing legacy distribution and fanout systems. Upgrades to the distribu-tion system are planned, but due to the required beam delivery schedule, they can only be deployed in sections during four-month annual maintenance cycles. The paper will also cover the off-the-shelf solutions that have been found for standardization, and the efforts towards a life cycle management process.
LA-UR-23-31123
 
poster icon Poster THPDP085 [3.311 MB]  
DOI • reference for this paper ※ doi:10.18429/JACoW-ICALEPCS2023-THPDP085  
About • Received ※ 29 September 2023 — Revised ※ 11 October 2023 — Accepted ※ 06 December 2023 — Issued ※ 13 December 2023
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THPDP088 ATCA-Based Beam Line Data Software for SLAC’s LCLS-II Timing System 1560
 
  • D. Alnajjar, M.P. Donadio, K.H. Kim, M. Weaver
    SLAC, Menlo Park, California, USA
 
  Funding: Work supported by US DOE contract DE-AC02-76SF00515
Among the several acquisition services available with SLAC’s high beam rate accelerator, all of which are contemplated in the acquisition service EPICS support package, resides the new Advanced Telecommunications Computing Architecture (ATCA) Beam Line Data (BLD) service. BLD runs on top of SLAC’s common platform software and firmware, and communicates with several high-performance systems (i.e. MPS, BPM, LLRF, timing, etc.) in LCLS, running on a 7-slot ATCA crate. Once linked with an ATCA EPICS IOC and with the proper commands called in the IOC shell, it initializes the BLD FPGA logic and the upper software stack, and makes PVs available allowing the control of the BLD data acquisition rates, and the starting of the BLD data acquisition. This service permits the forwarding of acquired data to configured IP addresses and ports in the format of multicast network packets. Up to four BLD rates can be configured simultaneously, each accessible at its configured IP destination, and with a maximum rate of 1MHz. Users interested in acquiring any of the four BLD rates will need to register in the corresponding IP destination for receiving a copy of the multicast packet on their respective receiver software. BLD has allowed data to be transmitted over multicast packets for over a decade at SLAC, but always at a maximum rate of 120 Hz. The present work focuses on bringing this service to the high beam rate high-performance systems using ATCAs, allowing the reuse of many legacy in-house-developed client software infrastructures.
 
poster icon Poster THPDP088 [1.060 MB]  
DOI • reference for this paper ※ doi:10.18429/JACoW-ICALEPCS2023-THPDP088  
About • Received ※ 03 October 2023 — Accepted ※ 06 December 2023 — Issued ※ 17 December 2023  
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