CP Violation Group at the University of Chicago

Cosmic ray bench test

Bench test setup

Since the construction of our main project has been deccelerated by the earthquake, we started working on an alternate experiment. All the parts of our new experimental device were designed and constructed by current or previous members of our team.
This experiment will study the scintillation light generated in CsI with the help of chamber tracking, caused by muon. Muons are present in cosmic rays which are abundant in atmosphere, so we don't need anything to generate them.
Our experimental apparatus consists of 2 chambers, an array of 4 x 4 = 16 CsI crystals, 3 layers of scintillators and a layer of lead. We're using wire chambers filled with a rare gas (*). Then, we will see how do our FADCs (data processing boards that we provide to the main project) work.
First, the rays with muons pass through a chamber, which is at the top of the apparatus. Afterwards, they pass through a CsI crystal, another chamber, and 2 layers of scintillators. Analyzing the data from these parts permits us to find the quantity of particles passing through. The following layer is a layer of lead, which filters all the particles that are not muons.
This apparatus was constructed during summer 2011 by the undergraduate members of our team who were guided by Jiasen and professor Wah. Currently, the construction is being finished, and the data are expected to come out soon.

Chamber:

(*) for further explanation of how these chambers work, see K. Kleinknecht - Particle detectors, Physics Reports, Vol. 84, pp. 85-161 (1982)

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