Cloudylabs
Cloudylabs Cloud chamber of 2024
updated
I put some Thoron for the test. This indicate that the observed tracks are not alpha because they are very long. This is protons, and 2 tracks are easily observable from this event. But... if you pause at the beginning, there is another track, coming from the same origin. Unfortunately the origin is black, there is not enough vapor to reveal the interaction. Why ? because some seconds before, this location was also the origin of 2 big alpha track which consumed a huge amount of vapor. So for this particuliar event, the origin is not known. But we observe surely 3 protons tracks.
What it could be : Probably a neutron which ejected 3 protons from a nucleus (Carbon, Oxygen, Nitrogen..). We don't see the recoiling nucleus, because it's path is only a few milimeter long and in the black area.
Other explanation : Deviation of an incoming proton. This event is unlikely due to the direction of delta ray (electrons ejected during the path of the protons). And we don't observe a substantial energy loss after the interaction (the density of tracks are the same). And the direction of the third particle (the ghost one) don't fit with this explanation.
More information about the physics here :
https://www.cloudylabs.fr/wp/decays-of-particles/
http://www.cloudylabs.fr/wp/air/
Ici, il s'agit de particules alpha provenant de la désintégration du gas thoron Rn 220, émanant de minéraux de thorite placés dans la capsule.
Pour éviter les réflexions lumineuses, il faut mettre un filet d'alcool sur la surface avant le démarrage (ce qui n'a pas été fait dans cette vidéo).
View of the nuclear particle in the V3 aircooled thermoelectric cloud chamber. It's some alpha particles coming from the decay of the gas Rn220 which come from thorite mineral placed in the white box. Put some alcohol on the interaction surface before turning on the experience to avoid the light reflection (no alcohol was put in this video).
At A, the muon is coming up to down and reach the point B where it encounter a nucleus (electrostatic collision) which deflect it a bit to the point C. The path B to C is erratic, this not a straight line like A to B, because during the collision, the muon lose a lot of its kinetic energy. It come at rest at C where it decay into an electron and a neutrino. But due to the large rest mass of the muon (105 MeV/c²), a lot of energy is shared between this last 2 particles. After the decay of the muon, the electron can get from 0 to 70 MeV of kinetic energy, but on average, it's 35 MeV and the rest for the neutrino.
What are we observing ? this is indeed the case. The track C-D is an electron with a very big energy as it's a straight line, showing no disturbance (deflection). At 35 MeV, the range in air is about 100 meters.
How are we sure it can be the disintegration of muon, and not the backscattering of a particle coming from D to C with a collision at C ? because after this process, it's very unlikely that the line B - A would be straight. It should be erratic, with a lot of deflection due to Coulomb interaction as the particle have literaly no kinetic energy left. So the initial particle, is coming from A.
How can we prove that ? with historic pictures. Take a look at :
https://www.cloudylabs.fr/wp/interactions-of-muons/#muondecay
and see how the electron is emmited like a straight line in the end of the muon track.
I'm happy about this.
Muon decay at 24:44 and youtube.com/watch?v=Z8R93e-l--M for explanation
00:17 Pair creation (middle of screen)
00:28 At right, ejection of an electron from an energetic incoming one.
00:32 At top left, a proton ejecting an electron
00:42 Far right top, a proton (top) ejecting 2 electrons
00:45 Bottom left, near middle. An electron is moving upward then encounter a nucleus and undergo a huge deflection (electrostatic collision). The electron lose a great energy by Bremsstrahlung during the collision and goes not too far after that. That we call a "kink".
00:53 Ejection of an electron from an energetic incoming one.
00:59 Alpha particle (natural radon Rn 222) ejecting an electron at the end of its path.
01:09 beautiful kink example
01:24 pair creation in middle of screen
01:30 nice path of electron, with a kink in the near end
01:50 In top, a particle of high energy, maybe a muon which undergo no deflection ? it's difficult to observe muon without a magnetic field to discriminate them from high energy electrons.
04:14 at right top, a violent kink, nice example of back scattering.
6:10 path of an electron
7:27 middle, an electron "fish" doing a double kink
9:21 middle right, multiple electron ejection from a pair creation ?
9:37 top right, begginning of an electromagnetic shower but not wonderful.
10:44 A discrete proton, not great not terrible.
10:45 a triplet creation a very rare electromagnetic process (same as pair creation, but this one occurs in the field of an electron). At 3 MeV in air the triplet effect is 100x time less probable than pair creation, but if the gamma is about 10 MeV, it's only 10x less probable. I rarely observed this event, possible it's the first with a good quality.
11:35 Tiny electromagnetic shower
11:38 large energy pair creation
12:36 at right another dramatic kink, but more fleeting
14:39 a kink
14:55 If you look closely, there is 2 energetic particle going straight up and down maybe protons coming from a far event outside the cloud chamber, maybe from the wall of the room.
16:49 2 pair creation separated 1 seconds appart (middle bottom and right)
17:13 top left Electromagnetic shower "not great"
If you see something useful you can indicate the timeline.
Some interesting observation are in this video for example :
19:35 A lonely energetic proton
24:24 A nucleus may have exploded from the impact of a likely neutron. The remnants after collision may be alpha particle, heavy charged nucleus (like the fat tiny track going to right) proton, deuteron.
24:29 A proton
24:44 Maybe the same event that 24:24 involving only protons (one of high energy going upward)
Thanks for watching !
www.cloudylabs.fr
At 00:23, there is a straight proton, right after the source.
I put some random music and I have to add the copyright there :
It Came Upon a Midnight Clear de Kevin MacLeod fait l'objet d'une licence Creative Commons Attribution 4.0. creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0
Source : http://incompetech.com/music/royalty-free/index.html?isrc=USUAN1100191
Artiste : http://incompetech.com
――――
Oxygen Garden de Chris Zabriskie fait l'objet d'une licence Creative Commons Attribution 4.0. creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0
Source : http://chriszabriskie.com/divider
Artiste : http://chriszabriskie.com
Set-up : 0 to 7 min
After 1 hour : 11:52
Magnetic field 12:04
After 2 hours : 13:53
Strontium 90 source 14:37
At 16:06, sorry I just hide the positon with the static image...
Thoron (Radon 220) : 17:50
Proton 20:59
X, Gamma-Rays : 21:21
Refill of alcohol after 5 hours : 23:51
This is a prototype made in April 2020. I traveled this machine all over France to perform stress test. I have to make some improvements, but I guess It's not too far from the final state. The infrared lamp should be used even if the outside temperature is warm because it help to stabilize the equilibrium. Check cloudylabs.fr for more informations about the physic of nuclear particles or to contact me if you want to acquire one of this machine. Thanks for your interest !
This is a compressor cooled (like a fridge) cloud chamber.
Visible area is 32x18 cm. It can works for hours without any assistance. There is a magnetic field under the surface which deflect the light particles. You can see that when an electron makes a spiral.
www.cloudylabs.fr
After 8 h run: youtube.com/watch?v=wHyeQYC2z8I
Most of the vapour condenses on the glass surface creating a mist, but a small fraction of it stays in vapour form above the cold condenser. This creates a layer of unstable sursaturated vapour which can condense at any moment. When a charged particle crosses this vapor, it can knock electrons off the molecules forming ions. It causes the unstable alcohol vapor to condense around ions left behind by the travelling ionizing particle : the path of the particle in the matter is then revealed by a track composed of thousands droplets of alcohol.
Any charged particle is visible in a cloud chamber. The most common ones are alphas, electrons, positons, protons, nuclear charged fragment, muons (...). Theses particles come from natural cosmic and telluric background radiations or from close radioactive sources. They will all leave tracks of different shapes in the chamber, based on their charge, mass and speed. Electrons are the lightest particles and will be easily deflected by magnetic fields. Alphas and protons are much heavier and slower and will thus ionize more, causing denser track of droplets. Interactions of neutral particles like gamma rays or neutrons can be seen thanks to the charged particles they create in matter.
See you at cloudylabs.fr for more experiments !
This video shows the Cloudylabs's cloud chamber running for approx. 50 min with an Uranium mineral. After 40 min, there is not enough alcohol to make newer trails. With time, the alcohol condense on the mineral. The small thickness of liquid alcohol on the mineral is enough to absorb a part of the energy of the alpha particles (their ranges in air for 5 MeV is 3-4 cm, but in water, it's 15 micrometer), so with time, the trails are shorter than in beginning. It's preferable to make such experience during 10 minutes to have longer alpha track.
Video with other radioactives sources (radium, americium, radon, tritium...) :
youtube.com/watch?v=XGNvAEtYZkw
Démonstration de la chambre à brouillard "Cloudylabs". Refroidie à eau et à base de 8 modules thermoélectrique, elle permet de voir les particules nucléaire d'une source ou du rayonnement naturel en 1 minute.
Cette vidéo montre comment démarrer la machine et les expériences réalisable.
Pendant toute la vidéo, un champ magnétique est présent dans la chambre (l'aimant se situe dans la machine, sous la surface sensible). Le champ permet de dévier les particules légères suivant leurs charges ce qui permet de les identifier (électron ou positon).
Je précise qu'il s'agit d'un détecteur : l'expérience ne crée pas la radioactivité, elle ne fait que "dévoiler" ce qui existe déjà !
Plus d'informations sur le site http://www.cloudylabs.fr
There is a difference about the hadronic component (proton and neutron). There is about 10x time more proton in 3000 m than in sea level (and neutron too) so we can see many more proton interaction in the Pic du Midi 's cloud chamber than the one in Paris. Proton leave thick straight trails and when a proton (or a neutron) hit a nucleus in the matter of the cloud chamber, it can produce other protons (spallation reaction). See the other video about observation of cosmic ray in altitude. The website http://www.cloudylabs.fr will give more explanations about the nuclear events observed.
The cloud chamber was temporarily put in the Pic du Midi (French Observatory in the Pyrenees) in 2012 for the 100th anniversary of the discovery of cosmic ray.
As this altitude, there is about 10 times more neutron and proton than in sea level. Theses particles can interact with the matter and break some nucleus which release other protons and neutrons, alpha particles or deuteron. The density of ionisation in a trail is proportionnal to z²/v² where z is the charge of the particle and v it's velocity. Thus, a proton with a low kinetic energy will make more ionization so the trail will be bigger than the trail of a high energy proton. A 5 MeV (0.1c) proton have a range of 34 cm in air, a 10 MeV one, 1.1 m.
The range of an alpha particle of 10 MeV in air is 10.4 cm.
Their is also higly energetic gamma ray (or energetic incoming electrons !), which can make electromagnetic shower (electrons and positon) in the matter (wall of the room, or wall of the machine which is made with 1 cm of glass). Single e+/e- comes from muon or Pi0 decay, or from the 3 interactions process of gamma in matter (photoelectric, compton and pair creation).
See the website http://www.cloudylabs.fr for more pictures and annotations about theses nuclear events. Feel free to give your thought about any interactions of the video.
The video show a complete recording of 11 minutes, taken with my HD camera and a polarizing filter. As expected at this altitude, we see many more protons than in sea level (about 10 times more). They come from spallation of cosmic particles (p,n) in the wall of the chamber, or from the nuclei (oxygen, nitrogen...) inside the chamber. Dimension of the surface of the machine is 45x45 cm.
See the website http://www.cloudylabs.fr for more pictures and commentary about theses nuclear events.
A magnet is put inside the machine, under the interaction surface, so during the whole video, a magnetic field is present and deflect the lightly charged particles (electrons).
More infos on http://www.cloudylabs.fr/


