GISAS – Analysis

Gracing incidence small angle scattering (GISAS) is a non-destructive technique especially suitable for the investigation of nanostructured thin films and multi-layers. Experiments can be performed using neutrons (gracing incidence small angel neutron scattering, GISANS) or X-rays (gracing incidence small angle X-ray scattering, GISAXS). GISAS has successfully been applied to numerous materials ranging from inorganic to biochemical systems. For using GISAS on the one hand suitable experimental setups are required. On the other hand, tools are necessary which allow the simulation of scattering on nanostructured systems and fitting of measured data. Focus of our work is the application of GISAS to a variety of thin layered systems but also further development of software for simulation and fitting. For this purpose a perturbation theoretic approach the Distorted Wave Born Approximation (DWBA) is used.

The simulation and fitting tools are developed in close cooperation with the BornAgain project. BornAgain is a software package developed by the Scientific Computing Group of the Heinz Maier-Leibnitz Zentrum, Garching. It is based on DWBA. BornAgain is a free multi-platform software. The open source is available under the GNU General Public License.