Particle physics is often seen as something only for huge research institutes, out of reach of the general public. Francisco Barradas-Solas and Paloma Alameda-Meléndez demonstrate how – with the aid of a homemade particle detector – you can dispel this myth by bringing particle physics to life in the classroom.
source emit in a flower-like
pattern at the center of a
continuous cloud chamber.
The particles are made visible
by means of alcohol vapour
diffusing from an area at
room temperature to an area
at -78 °C. This photograph
was taken in 1957. Click to
enlarge image
Public domain image; image
source: Wikimedia Commons
The objective of elementary particle physics is to find the basic building blocks of which everything is made and to investigate the behaviour of these building blocks. Although it can be seen as a cornerstone of science, particle physics is often neglected or poorly understood in schools, partly because it is perceived as unrelated to the things with which we interact on a daily basis. However, particle physicists detect and measure electrons, photons or muons every day with the same confidence with which all of us ‘detect’ cows, tables or aeroplanes. Furthermore, particle detectors (e.g. PET scanners) are routinely used, for example, by medical physicists to detect tumours and monitor the function of internal organs.
Here we demonstrate how to bring particle physics to life in the classroom, using possibly the simplest type of particle detector: a continuously sensitive diffusion cloud chamber. This homemade version consists simply of an airtight fish tank full of air and alcohol vapour, cooled to a very low temperature, which can be used to detect charged particles, particularly cosmic ray muons, if they have enough energy.
Elementary particles are the simplest elements from which everything is made. They are not just the building blocks of matter and radiation, but also give rise to the interactions between them (for more details of elementary particles, see Landua & Rau, 2008). These particles carry energy and momentum, and can thus be seen by detectors. Strictly speaking, you cannot directly see any particles – instead, their passage through detectors is inferred from the effects they cause, such as ionisation (for charged particles). That is precisely what we do when we observe the condensation trail left in the sky by an aeroplane that we cannot see – and what we can do with our homemade cloud chamber.
sensitive diffusion cloud
chamber
Image courtesy of Francisco
Barradas Solas
This cloud chamber is basically an airtight container filled with a mixed atmosphere of air and alcohol vapour. Liquid alcohol evaporates from a reservoir and diffuses through the air from the top to the bottom of the chamber. Cooling the base with dry ice (solid carbon dioxide, which is at a constant temperature of around –79 ºC while it sublimates) results in a strong vertical temperature gradient, so that a zone with supersaturated alcohol vapour forms close to the bottom. This sensitive layer is unstable, with more very cold alcohol vapour than it can hold. The process of condensation of vapour into liquid can be triggered by the passage of a charged particle with enough energy to ionise atoms in its path. These ions are the condensation nuclei around which liquid droplets form to make a trail.
chamber. Click to enlarge
image
Image courtesy of Francisco
Barradas Solas
image
Image prepared by Alberto
Izquierdo; courtesy of Francisco
Barradas Solas
in a cloud chamber (thick
and short: alpha particles;
long and thin: beta particles)
Image courtesy of Bionerd;
image source: Wikimedia
Commons
Although any charged particle with enough energy, for example from ambient radioactivity, can leave its trail in the chamber, the majority of the tracks will be made by secondary cosmic rays: particles created when other particles (mostly protons) coming from outer space hit the upper atmosphere. Secondary cosmic rays travel at close to the speed of light and are absorbed by the atmosphere or decay in flight, giving rise to new particles including muons, which can reach the surface of Earth and are easily detected. Muons are charged elementary particles very similar to electrons except for their mass (which is two hundred times larger).
image
Image prepared by Alberto
Izquierdo; courtesy of Francisco
Barradas Solas
In order to make the chamber really useful, we cannot limit ourselves to showing it and describing how it works. To support the explanation, we have prepared a short, simply written comic stripw1 (see below), showing how the chamber works and illustrating the origin and composition of cosmic rays through the story of a cosmic proton and its descendants.
We use this chamber at school with our 12- to 16-year-old students as part of an effort to help them see particles as real physical objects. Watching the visible trails left by invisible particles and comparing them to trails left by jet engines (in which much of the same physics is involved) is the first step in a process that we continue by introducing real data and pictures from high-energy physics into otherwise standard exercises and questionsw2, w3 (Cid, 2005; Cid & Ramón, 2009) and that we conclude with another, more complicated, detector for school use: a cosmic-ray scintillation detector which allows students to record and study data by themselves (Barradas-Solas, 2007).
Taken from the cloud chamber
comic strip; image courtesy of
Paloma Alameda-Meléndez
The authors would like to thank Dr Eleanor Hayes, Editor-in-Chief of Science in School, for her assistance in giving the final form to this article.
To access this article, which is freely available online, visit the website of the Institute of Technical Education, Madrid, Spain (http://palmera.pntic.mec.es) or use the direct link: http://tinyurl.com/y8ssyc5
Treiman’s book is one of the best to begin tackling the subtleties of quantum mechanics in particle physics (which we have avoided in this article), including virtual and unstable particles, and the field / particle relationship.
Comments
Congratulations
Thanks to you both for this interesting article that I am sure will help students and teachers to feel that Physics of Particles is closer to current life than is currently thouhgt
José Luis Hernández Neira
Ph. D in Physics
Teacher Training Advisor
Regional Center for Innovation and Training "Las Acacias"
Cloud Chamber
shamim hartevelt
For teachers and students looking to a further introduction to Radiation - which also includes how to build a cloud chamber - here is an interesting and useful animated curriculum related lessons on line from ESA humanspaceflight education.
http://www.esa.int/SPECIALS/Lessons_online/SEMVT1V7D7F_0.html