A Simple Cosmic Ray Detector

3rd Year Undergraduate Project 3C41 2002-2003

This URL : http://www.hep.ucl.ac.uk/~dwaters/3C41/3C41.html

This project was completed in March 2003

FINAL REPORT :

• Contents
• Executive Summary
• Chapter 1 (Introduction)
• Chapter 2 (Research)
• Chapter 3 (Experimental Investigations)
• Chapter 4 (Development of the Scintillator Design)
• Chapter 5 (Construction of the Detector)
• Chapter 6 (Electronic Components)
• Chapter 7 (Programming the FPGA)
• Chapter 8 (Production of Educational Materials)
• Chapter 9 (Website Development)
• Chapter 10 (Conclusion and Future Development)
• References
• Appendices I-VI
• Appendices VII-VIII
• Appendices IX-XI
• Appendices XII-XVI
• Appendix XVII

Original Project Brief :

Summary :

• The original proposal can be found here.
• Early indications suggest that ordinary lighting tubes may not give a clear enough signal for cosmic ray muons.
• The project will therefore be expanded to consider all possible detection techniques that could be used in the construction of a cosmic ray detector suitable for school demonstrations.

Initial Task List :
As a general preparation for this project, research the following areas

• The composition of cosmic rays.
• The origin of cosmic rays.
• The flux and energy distribution of cosmic rays at the surface of the earth.
• The principles of cosmic ray detection using :
• Scintillators
• Spark (or proportional) chambers
• Cerenkov radiation

Useful Links :

• Early attempts to use lighting tubes as a simple cosmic ray detector are partially described here : http://teachers.web.cern.ch/teachers/archiv/HST2000/teaching/expt/sascha/sascha.htm
• An excellent introduction to the physics of cosmic rays, and a description of a scintillator based detector : http://www2.slac.stanford.edu/vvc/cosmicrays/crslac.html
• Details of a spark chamber built at Birmingham University :  http://www.ep.ph.bham.ac.uk/general/SparkChamber/indexhh.html
• A project in the US to build small scintillator based detectors for schools :  http://www.lbl.gov/abc/cosmic
• Detailed data on cosmic ray fluxes and the interactions of different particles with data can be found here :  http://pdg.lbl.gov

Books :
Undergraduate textbooks on nuclear and particle physics should give you information, at least on the principles of particle detection :

• "Particle Physics" B. R. Martin & G. Shaw (Wiley)
• "Introduction to Nuclear and Particle Physics" A. Das & T. Ferbel (Wiley)

Board Members :

Dr. Mark Lancaster
Tel : 020 7679 7141
Email :  markl@hep.ucl.ac.uk

Dr. David Waters
Tel : 020 7679 7141
Email :  dwaters@hep.ucl.ac.uk