3.6

Units

What are units?

Units are a set of small classes in Mantid that define a unit of measure, and the conversions between various units.

The Unit Factory is a Dynamic Factory that creates and hands out instances of Mantid Unit objects.

Available units

The following units are available in the default Mantid distribution.

Name ID (as known by Unit Factory) Unit Relevant equation
Time of flight TOF \mu s TOF
Wavelength Wavelength \mathrm{\AA} \lambda = \frac{h}{p} = \frac{h \times \mathrm{tof}}{m_N \times L_{tot}} (see below)
Energy Energy meV E = \frac{1}{2} mv^2 = \frac{m_N}{2} \left ( \frac{L_{tot}}{\mathrm{tof}} \right )^2
Energy in wavenumber Energy_inWavenumber cm^{-1} 8.06554465 \times E
Momentum (k) Momentum \mathrm{\AA}^{-1} k = \frac{2 \pi }{\lambda}=\frac{2 \pi \times m_N \times L_{tot}}{h \times \mathrm{tof}}
d-spacing dSpacing \mathrm{\AA} d = \frac{n \, \lambda}{2 \, sin \, \theta}
Momentum transfer (Q) MomentumTransfer \mathrm{\AA}^{-1} Q = 2 \, k \, sin \, \theta = \frac{4 \pi sin \theta}{\lambda}
Momentum transfer squared (Q^2) QSquared \mathrm{\AA}^{-2} Q^2 \frac{}{}
Energy transfer DeltaE meV \Delta E = E_{i}-\frac{1}{2}m_N \left ( \frac{L_2}{\mathrm{tof}-L_1\sqrt{\frac{m_N}{2E_i}}} \right )^2
Energy transfer in wavenumber DeltaE_inWavenumber cm^{-1} 8.06554465 \times \Delta E
Spin Echo Length SpinEchoLength nm
constant \times \lambda^2
The constant is supplied in eFixed
Spin Echo Time SpinEchoTime ns
constant \times \lambda^3
The constant is supplied in eFixed

Where L_1 and L_2 are sample to the source and sample to detector distances respectively, L_{tot} = L_1+L_2 and E_i is the energy of neutrons leaving the source. \theta here is the Bragg scattering angle (e.g. half of the \theta-angle used in spherical coordinate system directed along Mantid z-axis)

Note on Wavelength: If the emode property in :ref: ConvertUnits <algm-ConvertUnits> is specified as inelastic Direct/Indirect (inelastic) then the conversion to wavelength will take into account the fixed initial/final energy respectively. Units conversion into elastic momentum transfer (MomentumTransfer) will throw in elastic mode (emode=0) on inelastic workspace (when energy transfer is specified along x-axis)

Working with Units in Python

Accessing units on workspaces

Units on MatrixWorkspaces are accessed via the Axis.

ws = CreateSampleWorkspace()
for i in range(ws.axes()):
    axis = ws.getAxis(i)
    print "Axis {0} is a {1}{2}{3}".format(i,
                                           "Spectrum Axis" if axis.isSpectra() else "",
                                           "Text Axis" if axis.isText() else "",
                                           "Numeric Axis" if axis.isNumeric() else "")

    unit = axis.getUnit()
    print "\t caption:{0}".format(unit.caption())
    print "\t symbol:{0}".format(unit.symbol())

Output:

Axis 0 is a Numeric Axis
   caption:Time-of-flight
   symbol:microsecond
Axis 1 is a Spectrum Axis
   caption:Spectrum
   symbol:

Setting the axisLabel to a Label of your choice

ws = CreateSampleWorkspace()
axis = ws.getAxis(1)
# Create a new axis
axis.setUnit("Label").setLabel('Temperature', 'K')

unit = axis.getUnit()
print "New caption:{0}".format(unit.caption())
print "New symbol:{0}".format(unit.symbol())

Output:

New caption:Temperature
New symbol:K

Adding new units

Writing and adding a new unit is relatively straightforward. Instructions will appear here in due course. In the meantime if a unit that you require is missing, then please contact the development team and we will add it to the default Mantid library.

Category: Concepts