Computing is essential to the science that we support. Software and data analysis are fundamental to our overall scientific process at ISIS. They enable our community to generate and visualise the results of their experiments. This is particularly important for many of our newer instruments, some of which have hundreds of thousands of detectors and generate a volume of data similar to the Human Genome every day. 

The scientific software team looks after data reduction and data analysis at ISIS.

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​Data reduction

The data reduction team looks after software for converting the raw neutron detection signals into analysable data. One of the key pieces of data reduction and analysis software used at ISIS is the Mantid framework that continues to grow to cover the many different scientific areas. Initially developed by ISIS in the 2000s, Mantid is now also a core part of the operation of the SNS facility in the USA, the ESS facility in Sweden and the ILL facility in France.

We use C++, python, and their interoperability to design and develop key areas of the Mantid interface and support further development of other key data reduction software.

Since 2018, we have been actively developing an Auto-Reduction system. This intelligent, configurable, web-based tool automatically reduces (a pre analysis step) the data and writes it into a secure access-restricted user folder. This allows facility users to subsequently access this data for use in their data analysis software. The majority of the code is written in python using ActiveMQ for message handling within a Django web framework.

Over the coming years there are various projects to exploit neutrons and muons further and software and data will be at the heart of realizing this.

Research Software Engineering (analysis, analytics and informatics)

The RSE team is interested in everything that happens after data reduction. We are interested in developing state of the art methods from the field of data science to assist in the interpretation of experimental results.​

Want to​ join us?

Fancy working with us developing software in the beautiful Oxfordshire countryside​? Or remotely at home or at our Daresbury Campus​ in Cheshire?

If you're experienced and want to help us make a difference, we'd love to hear from you.

Also, if you're interested in a starting your career with us, as an apprentice, intern, vacation or sandwich student, or work experience student, get in touch.

​For more information, please see: Careers in Computing​