MXCube

MXCube

MXCube is the user interface for mounting, centering and collecting data on crystals. It interfaces with sample data loaded into MXPrism (note that samples must be in MXPrism for the robot to be able to mount your samples). It can be access on a beamline computer on https://mxcube.mx3.beamline.synchrotron.org.au/.

Only one user can be in control of MXCube at once, and other users can log in as “observers”. An observer can request control by clicking on the “Remote” button and send a message to the current baton holder.

For a detailed workflow for data collection, please visit the Data Collection page.

 

Samples

Selecting the “Samples” tab at the top of the window allows you to view and select all pucks in the robot

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Selecting samples

 

Data Collection

  1. The data collection tab can be selected from the top banner.

  2. The centring mode can be selected from the left hand panel under ‘Phase Control’.

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Data collection

 

Centring

A crystal can be centred using ‘3-click centring'.

You can also centre manually using the buttons on the left hand panel.

You can also zoom in and out on the crystal using the zoom level button. Once you go beyond 5x zoom, the camera will turn black and white.

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Centring

 

 

Rastering

Clicking on “Draw Grid” allows you to draw a box around your crystal.

  • Note:

    • Crosshair needs to be in the grid

    • Zoom level needs to be the same as used for 3-click centre

You can adjust beam size on left hand panel to change size of grid search

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Rastering

 

 

Queue

The samples you have queued up (from the samples tab) will appear in the right-hand panel.

Click ‘Next sample’ to dismount the current sample and load the next sample in the queue.

If you want to skip ahead in the queue, you can select ‘Mount’ from the queued samples to manually select the next sample to analyse.

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Sample queue

 

 

Other useful features

Click the ‘snapshot’ button to take a photo of the crystal.

Tweak the resolution to change the detector distance

Set the transmission by inputting values (<2 % is good).

Ensure the shutter is open by toggling the ‘Mono shutter’ button.

To measure the dimensions of your crystal, you can right click anywhere and select ‘measure distances’. Then click two points (each edge of your crystal) to measure the distance.

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Useful buttons