The Cosmic Ray Observatory Project (CROP) in Nebraska

Gregory SnowUNL Department of Physics and Astronomy

September 22, 2006

• Overview and status• Lessons learned in 6 years• Education and training benefits• Our new funding proposal (Looking for Advisory Panel Members )

CROP article in Lincoln Journal Star, 7 August 2003

A few facts

• Funded by $1.34 Million NSF grant, 2000-2007• Co-PIs Greg Snow and Dan Claes• 26 Nebraska and 5 Colorado schools enlisted and trained in summer workshops of duration 2-4 weeks, about 5 new schools per summer• Venture into Colorado was a joint effort by CROP, WALTA, ALTA• Hosted 2 one-day meetings each academic year for participants from all years to report results, exchange faulty equipment, receive equipment and software upgrades, refresh training or train new students• External evaluation of this period has shown that CROP has accomplished most of its educational and scientific goals listed in the original proposal• CROP has also served as a great training ground for staff (undergrad, grad students) at UNL

Highlighted squares = participating schools

The Chicago Air Shower ArrayThe Chicago Air Shower Array

• CROP uses retired detectors from the Chicago Air Shower Array• 1089 boxes each with:

• 4 scintillators and photomultiplier tubes (PMT)• 1 high voltage and 1 low voltage power supply

• Two removal trips (September 1999, May 2001) yielded over 2000 scintillator panels, 2000 PMTs, 500 low and power supplies

U.S. Army PhotoSeptember 30,

1999

The CROP team at Chicago Air Shower Array (CASA) site

Equipment recovery trip to Dugway, Utah, May 2001

5 VoltDC power

To PCserial port

Four analogPMT inputs

Discriminatorthreshold

adjust

GPS receiverinput

Eventcounter

Programmablelogic device

Time-to-digitalconverters

CROP data acquisition electronics cardDeveloped by Univ. Nebraska, Univ. Washington, Fermilab (Quarknet)

• 43 Mhz (24 nsec) clock interpolates between 1 pps GPS ticks for trigger time• TDC’s give relative times of 4 inputs with 75 picosecond resolution

User-friendly, LabView-based control and monitoring GUI

Two detectorsfiring at thesame time

Data streamfor eachevent

Eventcounter

Elapsedrun

time

User-friendly, LabView-based control and monitoring GUI

Developed by CROP studentsJared Kite and Jason Keller

in collaboration with WALTA

Automated threshold scanfor discriminator settings

17 July 2000

Summer 2000 workshop

Summer 2001 Workshop

Summer 2002 workshop

Summer 2004 Workshop ActivitiesDetector assembly and testing

Summer 2004 Workshop ActivitiesOscilloscope and DAQ card lessons

Summer 2004 Workshop ActivitiesPractice experiments to be performed at school

Summer 2004 Workshop ActivitiesDetectors return to school

Detector set-ups at schools

“Telescope” set-ups forindoor experiments

• Rate vs. barometric pressure• Day-night variation• Rate vs. angle from zenith• Light attenuation vs. distance from PMT

Installation at Lincoln High School, August 2003

GPS receiver

Several school in process of moving to the roof after indoor experiements

Other Rooftop Installations

Some schools have installeddetectors on their rooftops

and are studying coincidencerates vs. separation

Summer 2005 1-week refresher workshop

• Over half the participating schools attended• New student (and teacher) training• Preparation for rooftop data taking

Omaha’s Creighton University Joined Us

Masters degree studentLyle Sass,

our “ambassador” toNE high schools

Fr. Tom McShanewith his

“Berkeley”CR detector

Visitors cementing ties to other projects

Visitors from HiSparc, Netherlands,and Turkey

Auger Observatorycollaborator

Dr. Pablo Bauleo,Colorado State Univ.

Morning classroom sessions

Dan explaining detection ofradiation with electroscopes

Presented abbreviated versionof our full classroom curriculum

Afternoon lab sessions

New students had exposureto full detector assemblyand testing procedures

Each school’s detector set ups exercised

Setting discriminator thresholdsand efficiency scans for high voltage

settings

Moving detectors outside for overnightair shower data taking run

Each school made new rooftop enclosures

Excellent extensive air showerdata taking run overnight

New enclosures making it to rooftops

Westside High SchoolOmaha, NE

Weights, important !!

Some lessons learned in 6 years

• Big variation among schools in independent activity/investigations during school year. Some real successes, some inactive sites

• Close contact very important during academic year

• Scheme for replacing/training new students as classes graduate important

• Classroom integration, affect on curriculum is not automatic. Scheme to guide this needed.

• Hardware and software delays create frustration and idleness

• Hard to recruit for long summer workshops

• High school schedules are packed, hard to get full participation in academic year Saturday meetings of all participants

Mount Michael High School “The Science Teacher”, November 2001

CROP research has been the basis for severalstudent science fair projects

that have placed highly in national competitions

Ben PlowmanLincoln High School

Study of light attenuation in CROP scintillators as a function ofdistance from the photomultiplier position

Nebraska’s 2006 PAEMST Science Teacher Award Recipient

Jim RynersonPhysics Teacher

Lincoln High SchoolCROP participant since 2001

Successes of CROP staff at UNL

CROP undergraduateKatie Everett

now in physics grad schoolUniversity of Buffalo

CROP undergraduatesAndy Kubik: Northwestern UniversityAndrea Fuscher: Vanderbilt University

Teachers College Masters DegreeStudent Tracy Evans

has gone on to high school science teaching in Nebraska

CROP undergrad Jason Kellernow in physics grad school

At UNL

Successes of CROP staff at UNL

Our first advanced degree

Xioashu XuM.S. degree in Statistics

August 2006

“Probability of Extensive Air Showers Based on

the Study of Accidental Coincidences in the Cosmic Ray Observatory Project”

• Main thrust: statewide growth to ~100 schools + continuous data-taking and analysis• State schools administered through 19 Educational Service Units• Present schools serve as “hubs” for expansion in each ESU• Train through regional workshops, 2-3 per summer

Submit renewal NSF proposal early late October 2006

Status of Argentina site• 1000 out of 1600 surface detectors installed making it the world’s largest array to date• 3 out of 4 fluorescence telescope buildings complete

The Pierre Auger Observatory

Cosmic ray air shower animation of an actual event

The Pierre Auger Observatory Grid of Surface Detectors

The Pierre Auger Observatory Fluorescence Detector Building

Fluorescence detectors “look”through windows at night

Antenna for transmission

of data

“Standard”3,100 km2

10,000km2

15,000km2

Auger North

Colorado

Pump station mesa

Stulp Hill

Widener Hill

Black Butte

Pruitt Mound

HW 287

HW 116

Lamar

Springfield

Jim Cronin

We now have the equipment in Lamarfor one detector set-up

Lamar

Upcoming proposal for Phase II of CROP – statewide expansion – will include SE Colorado extension and stronger tie to Auger Observatory

CROP detectors already usedin Auger North outreach

F. Sarazin and G. Snowmounted an Auger

display with posters,brochures, Geiger

counters, scintillators.oscilloscopes, …

Regional science fairat Lamar Community College

May 2006

• I haven’t mentioned the great work Dan has led with CROP’s Colorado schools making measurements of muon backgrounds in the Henderson Mine as part of DUSEL/UNO development

• See Dan’s talk tomorrow morning

CROP

Pierre Auger northern hemisphere site insoutheast Colorado

SCRODSALTA

CHICOS

WALTA ALTA

NALTAThe North American Large-Scale Time-Coincidence

Array

http://csr.phys.ualberta.ca/nalta/• Includes links to individual project Web pages

TECOP

PARTICLE

Aiming toward a worldwide networkof cosmic ray detectors