A sea of sparks: Seeing radioactivity

https://maurycyz.com/projects/spinthariscope/

28•maurycyz•1h ago

Comments

dvh•49m ago

I tried the same with bananas. Got nothing.

kergonath•42m ago

Potassium-40 is not an alpha emitter.

fecal_henge•38m ago

Maybe he used banana as the scintillator.

DetroitThrow•38m ago

That's unrelated. He's been diligently substituting bananas in many experiments to mostly disappointment.

thadt•23m ago

Bananas are like XML that way. If you're not getting the results you want, you're just not using enough of them.

lukasschwab•25m ago

You won't make one at home, but cloud chambers[^1] reveal individual alpha particle tracks.

There's one in the Musée des Arts et Métiers in Paris — blew my mind!

[^1]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cloud_chamber

Edit: turns out people make these at home all the time. Sick!

lukan•19m ago

Well, google for "DIY cloud chamber" did result in quite some entries. Apart from youtube channels, with the first entry a guide from CERN:

https://home.cern/news/news/experiments/how-make-your-own-cl...

alnwlsn•16m ago

This can be done at home with a little effort. Less effort if you can get dry ice easily.

https://hackaday.com/2019/01/13/see-the-radioactive-world-wi...

Yenrabbit•13m ago

You can easily make them at home (source, I did last weekend!). - Dry ice (mine came from something shipped cold) - Dark piece of metal (I used a 3D printer hot bed) on top of dry ice to get cold - IPA vapour (I poured some on a shop towel) - Some transparent container to house it all - I found a glass display cube on the side of the road, fish tanks or Tupperware also work. - Torch or something to provide side lighting Very cool to see evidence of the particles zooming around us, can highly recommend.

r2_pilot•9m ago

If you haven't experienced a spinthariscope, I can highly recommend it. I bought one as a Christmas present for a buddy and we both enjoy its demonstration of radioactivity.

cbm-vic-20•1m ago

Don't miss a chance to see the Cherenkov radiation effect at your local research reactor.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cherenkov_radiation

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