Simulation of X-ray beamlines with the new ray tracing tool XTrace

A novel X-ray tracing simulation tool XTrace has been developed recently in order to calculate the beam properties from the X-ray source (bending magnet, undulator, wiggler, etc.) through all optical elements (slit, filter, window, mirror, crystal monochromator, multilayer, etc.) and the sample to the detector. In XTrace, the diffraction by a perfect crystal is described by the dynamical theory taking into account refraction and absorption effects. The code has been used to simulate the X-ray beamline of the Synchrotron Laboratory for Environmental Studies (Synchrotron Umwelt-Labor (SUL)) at ANKA. XTrace has been successfully used to simulate precisely the beam parameters such as position, size, divergence, photon flux, transmission, heat load, etc. at any distance from the source. For a better insight it is also possible to visualize the beam profile, energy spectrum, transmission spectrum, intensity distribution, power density, heat load, foot print, DuMond diagram, ray propagation diagram, etc. An excellent agreement between measured and simulated flux intensities over the whole energy range at the sample position for the X-ray beamline SUL has been found. XTrace has been proven to be a reliable, powerful, fast and easy to use tool for describing existing and designing and optimizing new X-ray beamlines in the future.