# Source Models for Generating Photons¶

pyXSIM comes with three pre-defined SourceModel types for generating a new PhotonList, for use with the make_photons() function. Though these should cover the vast majority of use cases, there is also the option to design your own source model.

## Thermal Sources¶

ThermalSourceModel assumes the emission of a hot thermal plasma can be described by a model that is only dependent on temperature and metallicity, and is proportional to the density squared:

$\varepsilon(E) = n_en_H\Lambda(T, Z, E)$

ThermalSourceModel requires the use of a thermal spectral model, described in the next sub-section. From this spectral model, which depends on temperature and metallicity, a spectrum of photon energies can be generated from each cell or particle. Since generating a new spectrum for each cell would be prohibitively expensive, the cells are binned into a 1-D table of temperatures, and for each bin a spectrum is calculated. Provided the bins are finely spaced enough, the accuracy of this method is sufficient for most purposes.

Warning

This only works if your dataset has a (“gas”, “emission_measure”) field from yt, which is defined by yt if you have species defined in your dataset such that yt detects them and generates the (“gas”, “H_nuclei_density”) (total number density of all species of hydrogen) and (“gas”, “El_number_density”) (number density of free electrons) fields. If you do not have these fields defined in your dataset, you may assume full ionization by loading your dataset like this: ds = yt.load(filename, default_species_fields="ionized").

By default, setting up a ThermalSourceModel object requires the following arguments:

• spectral_model: The thermal spectral model to assume. Can be a string or SpectralModel instance. Currently, the only string value built into pyXSIM is "apec".

• emin: The minimum energy for the spectrum in keV.

• emax: The maximum energy for the spectrum in keV.

• nchan: The number of channels in the spectrum. If one is thermally broadening lines (the default), it is recommended that this number create an energy resolution per channel of roughly 1 eV.

• Zmet: The metallicity. Either a floating-point number for a constant metallicity, or the name of a yt field for a spatially-varying metallicity.

So creating a default instance is rather simple:

thermal_model = pyxsim.ThermalSourceModel("apec", 0.1, 11.0, 10000, 0.3)


However, this model is very customizable. There are a number of other optional parameters which can be set:

• temperature_field: The yt field to use as the temperature. Must have dimensions of temperature. The default is ("gas", "temperature") for grid-based datasets and ("PartType0", "Temperature") or ("io", "temperature") for particle-based datasets, depending on which is available.

• emission_measure_field: The yt field to use as the emission measure. Must have dimensions of number density or per-volume. The default is ("gas", "emission_measure") for grid-based datasets. For particle-based datasets, a new field is constructed, using the default density and mass fields of the dataset, and the fields ("PartType0", "ElectronAbundance") ("PartType0", "NeutralHydrogenAbundance") to construct the electron and hydrogen ion number densities if they are present in the dataset.

• kT_min: The minimum temperature in units of keV in the set of temperature bins. Default is 0.025.

• kT_max: The maximum temperature in units of keV in the set of temperature bins. Default is 64.0.

• n_kT: The number of temperature bins to use. Default is 10000.

• kT_scale: The scaling of the temperature bins, either “linear” or “log”. Default: “linear”

• method: The method used to generate the photon energies from the spectrum. Either "invert_cdf", which inverts the cumulative distribution function of the spectrum, or "accept_reject", which uses the acceptance-rejection method on the spectrum. The first method should be sufficient for most cases.

• thermal_broad: A boolean specifying whether or not the spectral lines should be thermally broadened. Default: True

• model_root: A path specifying where the model files are stored. If not provided, a default location known to pyXSIM is used.

• model_vers: The version identifier string for the model files, e.g. “2.0.2”. The default depends on the model used.

• var_elem: Used to specify the abundances of specific elements, whether via floating-point numbers of yt fields. A dictionary of elements and values should be specified. See Variable Abundances below for more details.

• nolines: If set to True, the photons for this source will be generated assuming no emission lines. Default: False

• abund_table: The solar abundance table assumed for the different elements. See the discussion in Changing the Solar Abundance Table below for more details. Default: "angr"

• prng: A pseudo-random number generator. Typically will only be specified if you have a reason to generate the same set of random numbers, such as for a test or a comparison. Default is the numpy.random module, but a RandomState object or an integer seed can also be used.

### Tweaking the Temperature Bins¶

As mentioned above, ThermalSourceModel bins the dataset’s cells/particles into a 1-D table of temperatures, each bin containing a spectrum. It is important that this temperature binning faithfully reflects the temperature distribution within the dataset adequately. It may be necessary to tweak the number, limits, or scaling of the temperature bins. Some example situations where it may be necessary to do this are:

• A situation in which there is a lot of low-temperature, high-density gas that is not expected to emit X-rays, in which case one could set kT_min to a higher value than these temperatures.

• A situation in which the temperatures in the dataset span a small dynamic range, in which case one would set both kT_min and kT_max to bracket this range, and set n_kT to ensure that the bins are finely spaced.

• A situation with both low and high temperature gas which are expected to emit X-rays, requiring resolution over a large dynamic range. One could set n_kT to a large value, or alternatively one could set kT_scale="log" to adopt logarithmic binning.

Some degree of trial and error may be necessary to determine the correct setup of the temperature bins.

### Changing the Solar Abundance Table¶

The abundance parameters discussed so far assume abundance of a particular element or a number of elements relative to the Solar value. Underlying this are the values of the Solar abundances themselves. It is possible to change the Solar abundance table in pyXSIM via the optional abund_table argument to ThermalSourceModel. By default, pyXSIM assumes the Anders & Grevesse 1989 abundances corresponding to a setting of "angr" for this parameter, but it is possible to use other tables of solar abundances. The other tables included which can be used are:

The Solar abundance table can be changed like this:

thermal_model = pyxsim.ThermalSourceModel("apec", 0.1, 20.0, 10000,
("gas","metallicity"),
prng=25, abund_table='lodd')


Alternatively, one can supply their own abundance table by providing a NumPy array, list, or tuple of abundances 30 elements in length corresponding to the Solar abundances relative to hydrogen in the order of H, He, Li, Be, B, C, N, O, F, Ne, Na, Mg, Al, Si, P, S, Cl, Ar, K, Ca, Sc, Ti, V, Cr, Mn, Fe, Co, Ni, Cu, and Zn. An example:

my_abund = np.array([1.00E+00, 8.51E-02, 1.12E-11, 2.40E-11, 5.01E-10,
2.69E-04, 6.76E-05, 4.90E-04, 3.63E-08, 8.51E-05,
1.74E-06, 3.98E-05, 2.82E-06, 3.24E-05, 2.57E-07,
1.32E-05, 3.16E-07, 2.51E-06, 1.07E-07, 2.19E-06,
1.41E-09, 8.91E-08, 8.51E-09, 4.37E-07, 2.69E-07,
3.16E-05, 9.77E-08, 1.66E-06, 1.55E-08, 3.63E-08])

thermal_model = pyxsim.ThermalSourceModel("apec", 0.1, 20.0, 10000,
prng=25, abund_table=my_abund)


### Variable Abundances¶

By default, ThermalSourceModel assumes all abundances besides H, He, and the trace elements are set by the single value or yt field provided by the Zmet parameter. However, more fine-grained control is possible. ThermalSourceModel accepts a var_elem optional argument to specify which elements should be allowed to vary freely. The syntax is the same as for Zmet, in that each element set can be a single floating-point value or a yt field name corresponding to a field in the dataset. var_elem should be a dictionary of key, value pairs where the key is the standard abbreviation for the element and the value is the single number or field name:

# Setting abundances by yt field names
Zmet = ("gas", "metallicity")
var_elem = {"O": "oxygen", "Ca": "calcium"}
source_model = pyxsim.ThermalSourceModel(0.05, 50.0, 10000, Zmet, var_elem=var_elem)

# Setting abundances by numbers
Zmet = 0.3
var_elem = {"O": 0.4, "Ca": 0.5}
source_model = pyxsim.ThermalSourceModel(0.05, 50.0, 10000, Zmet, var_elem=var_elem)


Whatever elements are not specified here are assumed to be set as normal, whether they are H, He, trace elements, or metals covered by the Zmet parameter.

### Non-Equilibrium Ionization¶

pyXSIM 2.2.0 and afterward has support for non-equilibrium ionization (NEI) emitting plasmas in ThermalSourceModel. First, one must create a dictionary mapping elements in their different ionization states to the corresponding fields in your dataset as seen from yt:

# The dict mapping ionization states of different elements to different
# yt fields
var_elem = {"H^1": ("flash", "h   "),
"He^0": ("flash", "he  "),
"He^1": ("flash", "he1 "),
"He^2": ("flash", "he2 "),
"O^0": ("flash", "o   "),
"O^1": ("flash", "o1  "),
"O^2": ("flash", "o2  "),
"O^3": ("flash", "o3  "),
"O^4": ("flash", "o4  "),
"O^5": ("flash", "o5  "),
"O^6": ("flash", "o6  "),
"O^7": ("flash", "o7  "),
"O^8": ("flash", "o8  ")
}


Note that no other elements will be modeled except those which are specified in var_elem.

The flag for NEI must be set nei=True when making the model object. Note that since the NEI tables are not bundled with pyXSIM, they must be downloaded from the AtomDB website and one must specify their location in model_root. One may also have to change the model_vers string if the model version is not the default "v3.0.9".

# model files are located here
model_root = "/Users/jzuhone/atomdb_v3.0.9"

source_model = pyxsim.ThermalSourceModel("apec", 0.3, 1.7, 1000,
("gas","metallicity"), nei=True,
model_root=model_root,
var_elem=var_elem)


### Examples¶

Here, we will show several examples of constructing ThermalSourceModel objects.

An example where we use the default parameters, and a constant metallicity:

thermal_model = pyxsim.ThermalSourceModel("apec", 0.1, 20.0, 10000, 0.5)


An example where we use a metallicity field and change the temperature field:

thermal_model = pyxsim.ThermalSourceModel("apec", 0.1, 20.0, 10000,
("gas", "metallicity"),
temperature_field=("hot_gas","temperature")


An example where we change the limits and number of the temperature bins:

thermal_model = pyxsim.ThermalSourceModel("apec", 0.1, 20.0, 10000, 0.3,
kT_min=0.1, kT_max=100.,
n_kT=50000)


An example where we turn off thermal broadening of spectral lines, specify a directory to find the model files, and specify the model version:

thermal_model = pyxsim.ThermalSourceModel("apec", 0.1, 20.0, 10000, 0.3,
model_root="/Users/jzuhone/data",
model_vers="3.0.3")


An example where we specify a random number generator:

thermal_model = pyxsim.ThermalSourceModel("apec", 0.1, 20.0, 10000, 0.3,
prng=25)


Turning off line emission:

thermal_model = pyxsim.ThermalSourceModel("apec", 0.1, 20.0, 10000, 0.3,
prng=25, nolines=True)


## Power-Law Sources¶

PowerLawSourceModel assumes that the emission can be described by a pure power law:

$\varepsilon(E) = K\left(\frac{E}{E_0}\right)^{-\alpha}, E_{\rm min} \leq E \leq E_{\rm max}$

between the energies emin and emax, with a power-law spectral index alpha. The power law normalization $$K$$ is represented by an emission_field specified by the user, which must have units of counts/s/keV in the source rest frame. alpha may be a single floating-point number (implying the spectral index is the same everywhere), or a field specification corresponding to a spatially varying spectral index. A reference energy e0 (see above equation) must also be specified.

### Examples¶

An example where the spectral index is the same everywhere:

e0 = (1.0, "keV") # Reference energy
emin = (0.01, "keV") # Minimum energy
emax = (11.0, "keV") # Maximum energy
emission_field = "hard_emission" # The name of the field to use (normalization)
alpha = 1.0 # The spectral index

plaw_model = pyxsim.PowerLawSourceModel(e0, emin, emax, emission_field, alpha)


Another example where you have a spatially varying spectral index:

e0 = YTQuantity(2.0, "keV") # Reference energy
emin = YTQuantity(0.2, "keV") # Minimum energy
emax = YTQuantity(30.0, "keV") # Maximum energy
emission_field = "inverse_compton_emission" # The name of the field to use (normalization)
alpha = ("gas", "spectral_index") # The spectral index field

plaw_model = pyxsim.PowerLawSourceModel(e0, emin, emax, emission_field, alpha)


## Line Emission Sources¶

LineSourceModel assumes that the emission is occuring at a single energy, and that it may or may not be broadened by thermal or other motions. In the former case, the emission is a delta function at a single rest-frame energy $$E_0$$:

$\varepsilon(E) = A\delta(E-E_0)$

In the latter case, the emission is represented by a Gaussian with mean $$E_0$$ and standard deviation $$\sigma_E$$:

$\varepsilon(E) = \frac{A}{\sigma_E\sqrt{2\pi}}e^{-\frac{(E-E_0)^2}{2\sigma_E^2}}$

When creating a LineSourceModel, it is initialized with the line rest-frame energy e0 and an emission_field field specification that represents the normalization $$A$$ in the equations above, which must be in units of counts/s. Optionally, the line may be broadened by passing in a sigma parameter, which can be a field specification or YTQuantity, corresponding to either a spatially varying field or a single constant value. In either case, sigma may have units of energy or velocity; if the latter, it will be converted to a broadening in energy units via $$\sigma_E = \sigma_v\frac{E_0}{c}$$.

Note

In most cases, you will want velocity broadening of lines to be handled by the inputted velocity fields instead of by the sigma parameter. This parameter is designed for thermal or other sources of “intrinsic” broadening.

### Examples¶

An example of an unbroadened line:

e0 = YTQuantity(5.0, "keV") # Rest-frame line energy
emission_field = ("gas", "line_emission") # Line emission field (normalization)
line_model = pyxsim.LineSourceModel(e0, line_emission)


An example of a line with a constant broadening in km/s:

e0 = YTQuantity(6.0, "keV")
emission_field = ("gas", "line_emission") # Line emission field (normalization)
sigma = (500., "km/s")
line_model = pyxsim.LineSourceModel(e0, line_emission, sigma=sigma)


An example of a line with a spatially varying broadening field:

e0 = YTQuantity(6.0, "keV")
emission_field = ("gas", "line_emission") # Line emission field (normalization)
sigma = "dark_matter_velocity_dispersion" # Has dimensions of velocity
line_model = pyxsim.LineSourceModel(e0, line_emission, sigma=sigma)


## Designing Your Own Source Model¶

Though the three source models above cover a wide variety of possible use cases for X-ray emission, you may find that you need to add a different source altogether. It is possible to create your own source model to generate photon energies and positions. We will outline in brief the required steps to do so here. We’ll use the already exising PowerLawSourceModel as an example.

To create a new source model, you’ll need to make it a subclass of SourceModel. The first thing your source model needs is an __init__ method to initialize a new instance of the model. This is where you pass in necessary parameters and initialize specific quantities such as the spectral_norm and redshift to None. These will be set to their appropriate values later, in the setup_model method. In this case, for a power-law spectrum, we need to define the maximum and minimum energies of the spectrum (emin and emax), a reference energy (e0), an emissivity field that normalizes the spectrum (emission_field), and a spectral index field or single number alpha:

def __init__(self, e0, emin, emax, emission_field, alpha, prng=None):
self.e0 = parse_value(e0, "keV")
self.emin = parse_value(emin, "keV")
self.emax = parse_value(emax, "keV")
self.emission_field = emission_field
self.alpha = alpha
self.prng = parse_prng(prng)
self.spectral_norm = None
self.redshift = None
self.ftype = None


You need to also have an attribute for the yt field type stored in self.ftype so that things such as position and velocity fields can be determined. It’s also always a good idea to have an optional keyword argument prng for a custom pseudo-random number generator. In this way, you can pass in a random number generator (such as a RandomState instance) to get reproducible results.

The next method you need to specify is the setup_model method:

def setup_model(self, data_source, redshift, spectral_norm):
self.spectral_norm = spectral_norm
self.redshift = redshift
self.scale_factor = 1.0 / (1.0 + self.redshift)
self.ftype = data_source.ds._get_field_info(self.emission_field).name[0]


It is called from from_data_source() and is used to set up the distance, redshift, and other aspects of the source being simulated. This does not happen in __init__ because we may want to use the same source model for a number of different sources. You need to use one of the normalization fields (in this case the emission field) to determine the field type.

The next method you need is __call__. __call__ is where the action really happens and the photon energies are generated. __call__ takes a chunk of data from the data source, and for this chunk determines the emission coming from each cell based on the normalization of the emission (in this case given by the yt field "norm_field") and the spectrum of the source. We have reproduced the method here with additional comments so that it is clearer what is going on.

def __call__(self, chunk):

# Determine the number of cells in this chunk
num_cells = len(chunk[self.norm_field])

# alpha can either be a single float number (the spectral index
# is the same everywhere), or a spatially-dependent field.
if isinstance(self.alpha, float):
alpha = self.alpha*np.ones(num_cells)
else:
alpha = chunk[self.alpha].v

# Here we are integrating the power-law spectrum over energy
# between emin and emax. "norm_fac" represents the factor
# you get when this is done. We need special logic here to
# handle both the general case where alpha != 1 and where
# alpha == 1. The "norm" that we compute at the end represents
# the approximate number of photons in each cell.
norm_fac = (self.emax.v**(1.-alpha)-self.emin.v**(1.-alpha))
norm_fac[alpha == 1] = np.log(self.emax.v/self.emin.v)
norm = norm_fac*chunk[self.emission_field].v*self.e0.v**alpha
norm[alpha != 1] /= (1.-alpha[alpha != 1])
norm *= self.spectral_norm*self.scale_factor

# "norm" is now the approximate number of photons in each cell.
# We will determine the number of photons from "norm" assuming
# a Poisson distribution.
number_of_photons = self.prng.poisson(lam=norm)

# Generate an empty array for the energies
energies = np.zeros(number_of_photons.sum())

# Here we loop over the cells and determine the energies of the
# photons in each cell by inverting the cumulative distribution
# function corresponding to the power-law spectrum. Here again,
# we have to do this differently depending on whether or not
# alpha == 1.
start_e = 0
end_e = 0
for i in range(num_cells):
if number_of_photons[i] > 0:
end_e = start_e+number_of_photons[i]
u = self.prng.uniform(size=number_of_photons[i])
if alpha[i] == 1:
e = self.emin.v*(self.emax.v/self.emin.v)**u
else:
e = self.emin.v**(1.-alpha[i]) + u*norm_fac[i]
e **= 1./(1.-alpha[i])
energies[start_e:end_e] = e * self.scale_factor
start_e = end_e

# Finally, __call__ must report the number of cells with photons, the
# number of photons in each cell which actually has photons, the actual
# indices of the cells themselves,
# and the energies of the photons.
active_cells = number_of_photons > 0
ncells = active_cells.sum()

return ncells, number_of_photons[active_cells], active_cells, energies[:end_e].copy()