Geometry module¶

The ACTS geometry model is strongly based on the ATLAS Tracking geometry. Its core is built on a surface-based description that make up all geometry objects of higher complexity. This design has been chosen as the surface objects can be used together with the track propagation module and thus all geometry objects become natively integrated into the tracking software.

GeometryObject base class and GeometryIdentifier¶

All geometry objects in Acts inherit from a virtual GeometryObject base class

class GeometryObject {
public:
/// Defaulted construrctor
GeometryObject() = default;

/// Defaulted copy constructor
GeometryObject(const GeometryObject&) = default;

/// Constructor from a value
///
/// @param geometryId the geometry identifier of the object
GeometryObject(const GeometryIdentifier& geometryId)
: m_geometryId(geometryId) {}

/// Assignment operator
///
/// @param geometryId the source geometryId
GeometryObject& operator=(const GeometryObject& geometryId) {
if (&geometryId != this) {
m_geometryId = geometryId.m_geometryId;
}
return *this;
}

/// @return the geometry id by reference
const GeometryIdentifier& geometryId() const;

/// Force a binning position method
///
/// @param gctx The current geometry context object, e.g. alignment
/// @param bValue is the value in which you want to bin
///
/// @return vector 3D used for the binning schema
virtual Vector3 binningPosition(const GeometryContext& gctx,
BinningValue bValue) const = 0;

/// Implement the binningValue
///
/// @param gctx The current geometry context object, e.g. alignment
/// @param bValue is the dobule in which you want to bin
///
/// @return float to be used for the binning schema
virtual double binningPositionValue(const GeometryContext& gctx,
BinningValue bValue) const;

/// Set the value
///
/// @param geometryId the geometry identifier to be assigned
void assignGeometryId(const GeometryIdentifier& geometryId);

protected:
GeometryIdentifier m_geometryId;
};


This class ensures that a unique GeometryIdentifier is assigned to every geometry object. The GeometryIdentifier is mainly used for fast identification of the type of the geometry object (as most are either extensions or containers of the Surface objects) and for the identification of the geometry surfaces after building, e.g. for the uploading/assigning of material to the surface after creation. The GeometryIdentifier uses a simple masking procedure for applying an identification schema.

It is used for Acts internal applications, such as material mapping, but not for EventData and Geometry identification in an experiment setup, for this the Identifier class is to be used and/or defined.

typedef uint64_t geo_id_value;

namespace Acts {

/// @class GeometryIdentifier
///
///  Identifier for Geometry nodes - packing the
///  - (Sensitive) Surfaces    - uses counting through sensitive surfaces
///  - (Approach)  Surfaces    - uses counting approach surfaces
///  - (Layer)     Surfaces    - uses counting confined layers
///  - (Boundary)  Surfaces    - uses counting through boundary surfaces
///  - Volumes                 - uses counting given by TrackingGeometry
class GeometryIdentifier
{
public:
const static geo_id_value volume_mask    = 0xff00000000000000;
const static geo_id_value boundary_mask  = 0x00ff000000000000;
const static geo_id_value layer_mask     = 0x0000ff0000000000;
const static geo_id_value approach_mask  = 0x000000f000000000;
const static geo_id_value sensitive_mask = 0x0000000ffff00000;
const static geo_id_value channel_mask   = 0x00000000000fffff;
...
};


Surface classes¶

The Surface class builds the core class of all geometry objects and can be used natively with the propagation and extrapolation modules. The common Surface virtual base defines the public interface of all surfaces. The different concrete Surface classes are defined by their respective native local coordinate system, while different shapes on surfaces are defined by SurfaceBounds classes which every surface must provide. In case of boundless surfaces, a special InfiniteBounds class is available.

Surface Type

Local Coordinates

Bound Types available

ConeSurface

[rphi, z]

ConeBounds

CylinderSurface

[r, phi]

CylinderBounds

DiscSurface

[r, phi]

RadialBounds, DiscTrapezoidalBounds

PlaneSurface

[x, y]

RectangleBounds, TrapezoidalBounds, TriangleBounds,
InfiniteBounds, EllipseBounds

PerigeeSurface, StrawSurface

[d, z]

CylinderBounds

Layer classes¶

The Layer class is an extension of the Surface class that allows the definition of sub surfaces (sensitive surfaces for modules, or extra material surfaces).

The Layer can simply correspond to a ‘virtual’ surface in the detector description or represent a more complex object that may contain:

• a representing surface, which is accessible via a representingSurface()

• method an array of contained surfaces, accessible via surfaceArray() method

• approach surfaces (i.e. boundary surface of the volume occupied by the layer)

• surface material description on any of the confined surfaces

The following illustration shows an x-y view of a cylinder layer with planar detection modules:

Modules can be sorted onto layer using all supported binning methods described through the SurfaceArray class, the binning can be adjusted to fit as good as possible.

The un-occupied space in a volume which contains a layer array is filled with objects of type NavigationLayer, which allows that in a fully static geometry setup, every single point in a volume can be associated with a layer. Layer objects are confined together in a special LayerArray class and can be contained by a TrackingVolume.

Volume classes¶

The Volume class is a container of BoundarySurface objects, where each BoundarySurface is an extension of the Surface class with additional information about the attached Volumes. The normal vector of the surface defines an inside (opposite w.r.t. the normal vector) and an outside (along w.r.t. the normal vector) direction. Either a single volume or an array of volumes can be attached to a volume.

The simples volume class is just a collection of surfaces, where the TrackingVolume describes a volume that can contain:

• an array of contained layers

• an array of contained volumes (as a container volume)

• an array of contained volumes (as floating objects)

• a volume based material description

The shape of the volume is defined by VolumeBounds classes that create the corresponding bounding surfaces and register the attachment to the volume itself at creation.

Material description¶

Two types of material description exist, one for a surface based material, one for a volume based material. They will be dealt with differently in the extrapolation.

The basic information for any material is:

• the radiation length X0 the nuclear interaction length L0 the atomic weight A

• the atomic charge Z the density of the material

This information is confined together in the Material class.

Surface based material extends this material information by representative thickness, the corresponding object is called MaterialSlab. The thickness hereby can be arbitrarily chosen in order to regulate the material budget, it does not have to represent the actual thickness of a detector element. To attach it to a surface, a dedicated SurfaceMaterial class (or it’s extensions) is used, which allows to also describe binned material.

Possible extensions are:

• HomogeneousSurfaceMaterial, homogeneous material description on a surface

• BinnedSurfaceMaterial, an arbitrarily binned material description with a corresponding BinUtility object

• ProtoSurfaceMaterial, only binning description (without material) to be used in the material mapping process

Geometry building¶

The geometry building procedure follows the ATLAS TrackingGeometry philosophy of a static frame of glued volumes, that lead the navigation flow through the geometry,

Attaching a 3D detector geometry¶

Usually, a 3D detector model geometry exists, which is either native to the full detector simulation (Geant4) or is translated into it. This model, however, is in general too detailed for track reconstruction: navigating through the detailed detector geometry

For most part of the track reconstruction, only a surface based description of the detector is needed, in order to allow (surface based) material integration and parametrization/ prediction of trajectories on detection surfaces. It is thus necessary that the detection surfaces are described to full detail in the reconstruction geometry (called TrackingGeometry). This is guaranteed by a proxy mechanism that connects the detection elements (conveniently called DetectorElement) to Surface object in the reconstruction:

Existing plugins for 3D geometry libraries¶

Very simple helper methods for 3D libraries exist, they are certainly not optimised, but used for templating:

• TGeoDetectorElement connects a TGeo volume to a Surface (see [](TGeo plugin))

• DD4HepDetectorElement connects a DD4hep volume (based on TGeo) to a Surface (see [](DD4hep plugin))

Layer building¶

Surface object that are to be grouped on a layer should be put into a SurfaceArray and provided to the layer. Certain helper tools exist to ease the translation and create appropriate binning structure: TheSurfaceArrayCreator can create cylindrical, disc-like & planar layers, where the dimensions of the layer are determined by parsing the provided surfaces. Additionally, an envelope covering the surfaces can be chosen.

Volume building, packing, and gluing¶

The philosophy of the TrackingGeometry is a fully connective geometry setup, i.e. TrackingVolume objects are either pure containers for other contained TrackingVolume instances (where the contained volumes fully fill the space of the container volume), or are fully attached via the boundary surface mechanism. The boundary surfaces then act as portals from one TrackingVolume into the next one along the trajectory.

The process to create a fully connected tracking geometry is called glueing. Wherever possible, common boundary surfaces are shared, where this is not possible, they are attached.

For cylindrical detector setups, a dedicated CylinderVolumeBuilder is provided, which performs a variety of volume building, packing and gluing.