A Portable Cosmic Ray Detector for Engineering, IoT, and Science Research

摘要

A portable and cost-effective cosmic ray detector designed and built for engineering and scientific education and research is presented. The design is an improvement over previous designs as it allows for more flexibility in setting up experimental conditions. The basic design and operation are described. Preliminary background photon measurements, predominantly gamma rays, are presented. The detector's response to a radioactive mineral, monazite, is shown. The use of a histogram in lieu of a multi-channel analyzer to capture the shape of the gamma spectrum is demonstrated. The results show that the detector can reliably detect the intensity and energy spectrum of gamma radiation. This cosmic ray detector is designed to be used in large-scale physics research as well as projects involving Raspberry Pi and Internet of Things.