Project:Subatomic metrology

Summary:

A project to acquire the nessassery apparatus and knowhow to allow for the meaningful study radioactivity and subatomic particles in general.

equipment

One of the main standards in electronic equipment intended for study of nuclear phenomimum is the NIM or nuclear instrumintation module. These are basicly a slender box with a standard power connector on the rear which slots into a chassis known as a NIM bin or creat. There is a vast array of NIMs available to perform numerious electronic functions from the very spesific to the quite generic. The advantage of this system are twofold. First, extreme flexibility it afforded by the modular nature of the system. Secondly this is an old standard and as such NIMs often come up on ebay for not too hidious prices. though some of these may be quite old, they are usualy made to extremely high standards with very high quality conponents, making repair a worthwhile option.

NIM bins would commonly consume about 6U in a 19" rack, however i have a slightly smaller one, capible of housing 7 NIMs which should be enough to get us started. I also have a basic set of NIMs whith which to populate it, a HV PSU, a counter/timer, signal amplifier and rate meter.

I will also be providing a somewhat decrepit NaI:Tl scintillation counter and a thin window GM tube

equipment required:

The main thing we are lacking is a multichannel analyzer, this apparatus digitizes pulses generated by a detector and presents them as a histogram of pulse height (and therefore radiation energy) against occourence thus generating a spectra of the energy of radiation.

A better scintilator would be nice, my chunk of NaI is going cloudy ;(

more NIMs are always good... you can't have too many!

Proposed uses:

investigation of radioactivity in common and novel items determination of radionuclide present in items by analysis of decay (e.g chunks of rock) investigation of novel detector materials, growing of scintillation crystals, novel semiconductor detectors investigation of anthropogenic background radiation and cosmic background.

Training required:

due to the complexity and flexibility of the NIM system, some training will be required to enable proper operation. High voltages are required for many of the sensors involved. the thin window GM tube is *extremely* fragile and somewhat irreplaceable so *please* be carefull with it.