ORNL, 19-23 May 2008
This Short Course on the Geant4 Simulation Toolkit is hosted by RSICC at the Oak Ridge National Laboratory.
Abstract | Programme | Lecture notes:
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Training team |
Geant4 is a software toolkit for the
simulation of the interaction of particles with matter, developed and
maintained by a world-wide collaboration of physicists and computer scientists. Its application areas include high energy physics
experiments, astrophysics and astroparticle physics, nuclear physics, space science, medical
physics and medical imaging, radiation
protection etc. It exploits software engineering techniques and the object
oriented technology to achieve transparency of the physics implementation,
as well as openness to extension and evolution. The toolkit provides
functionality for all the typical domains of detector
simulation, such as Geometry modeling, Detector Response, Run and Event
management, Tracking, Visualisation and User Interface. An abundant set of Physics Processes
handle the diverse interactions of particles with matter across a wide energy
range, as required by Geant4 multi-disciplinary nature; for many physics
processes a choice among different models is available.
The Geant4 source code and libraries are freely available, accompanied by
an extensive set of user documentation.
The course provides an overview of Geant4 capabilities and teaches how to simulate an experimental set-up; the lectures are complemented by hands-on exercises. As a result of the course the students will learn how to develop their own simulation applications based on the Geant4 toolkit.
To best profit of the course, some basic knowledge of the C++ computing language is recommended. The exercises are performed in a Linux environment.
The course is articulated over 5 units, each one spread across a day and
addressing a specific simulation domain.
Each unit consists of morning lectures and practical exercises in the afternoon
on the topics learned in the morning, with the exception of the last afternoon
devoted to a discussion session.
The morning and afternoon sessions are scheduled over a duration of 3 hours
approximately with a 30' tea break each and a Business Lunch (with exercises) break in between.
The hands-on sessions adopt a common pattern:
Unit 1 - 19 May - The basics
This unit provides an overview of Geant4
capabilities and basic concepts of a Geant4-based simulation application.
To facilitate students not familiar with the computing technologies applied in
the course, a refresher introduction to object oriented programming and Linux
operating system is provided.
The hands-on session deals with installing Geant4 and satellite products and
guides the students to execute simple examples included in the Geant4 toolkit.
Tea break (with discussion)
Business Lunch (with exercises)
Introduction to Linux - A. Lechner
Tea break (with discussion) during Geant4 compilation
Geant4 installation - A. Lechner
Novice examples - L. Pandola
Unit 2 - 20 May - How to describe an experimental set-up
Tea break (with discussion)
Detector modelling 2
Business Lunch (with exercises)
Exercise: modelling an experimental configuration (A. Lechner, L.
Pandola)
Tea break (with discussion) during the exercises
Unit 3 - 21 May - Physics in Geant4
This unit provides a thorough overview of the physics
processes and models available in Geant4 to simulate particle interactions with
matter.
The hands-on session shows how to select the processes and models to be active
in a user application; simple examples of physics configuration for various use
cases are exercised, pertinent to different particle types and energy ranges.
Physics 1
Tea break (with discussion)
Physics 2
Business Lunch (with exercises)
Exercise: selecting physics in the simulation
(A. Lechner, L. Pandola)
Tea break (with discussion) during the exercises
Unit 4 - 22 May - How to retrieve information from the simulation
Tea break (with discussion)
Business Lunch (with exercises)
Installation of analysis tools (A. Lechner)
Exercise: retrieving and analyzing results from the simulation (A.
Lechner, L. Pandola)
Tea break (with discussion) during the exercises
Unit 5 - 23 May - Beyond the basics
This unit illustrates some additional Geant4 capabilities
beyond the basic tools illustrated in the previous lectures and shows how to run
Geant4-based simulations in parallel mode.
The short afternoon session is devoted to discussion.
Tea break (with discussion)
Business Lunch (with exercises)
Discussion session
Documentation for setting up the PC used in the course - A. Lechner
Software to be installed on the students' PC (under Windows XP, not required if
the OS is a Linux flavour) - A. Lechner
iAIDA primer - A. Lechner
The lecture notes
used in the course can be freely downloaded;
PLEASE NOTE that no paper copies will be distributed during the course.
Geant4 User Documentation can be browsed from the web or downloaded for printing.
The training team covers various areas of expertise in Geant4 development and applications:
Anton Lechner,
Tech. Univ. Vienna, Austria and CERN, Switzerland
Luciano Pandola, INFN LNGS
(Gran Sasso National Laboratory), Italy
Maria
Grazia Pia,
INFN Sezione di Genova, Via Dodecaneso 33, 16146 Genova, Italy - Phone: +39 010
353 6328, Fax: +39 010 313358
The course is based on training material by the Geant4 Collaboration, complemented by original material by the instructors listed above; in particular, thanks to K. Amako (KEK), M. Asai (SLAC), G. Cosmo (CERN), A. Heikkinen (Helsinki Institute of Physics), A. Howard, M. Maire (LAPP), Y. Morita, A. Pfeiffer (CERN), T. Sasaki (KEK), S. Tanaka (Ritsumeikan Univ.), M. Verderi (IN2P3), D. Wright (SLAC), H. Yoshida (Naruto Univ.).
Last update 19 maggio 2008 - Maria Grazia Pia