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Project Outline

The DIY Particle Detector project was supported by the Fellow FreiesWissen 2020 grant program, hosted by Wikimedia Germany, from October 2020 through June 2021.

This drawing summarises the main purpose of the project: Students and curious humans (like the stick figure in the middle) need modern low-cost & open science hardware instruments that enable the exploration and a better understanding of natural radioactivity. #CitizenScience

My original fellowship application can be found in German on the Fellow FreiesWissen program page of 2020 together with the early version of the logbook which was moved here.

Main Project Goals & Milestones

The following initial goals were set after the first meeting with all program mentors and the other fellows in October 2020.

Hardware & Software Development

improve the web-based measurement software
develop the detector more towards a smartphone accessory => improve ease of use
increase detector sensitivity (e.g. cosmic rays) with a redesign of the electronics

Milestones:

new hardware revision by June 2021
incremental software updates throughout the year

Documentation

select easier to access multi-language capable web site service than the existing GitHub Wiki
translate English project docs into German, support others to do the same in their native languages
start blogging about it
produce video material
more build instructions based on 3D models

Milestones:

blog and first article: January 2020
dedicated project website: March 2020
wiki & documentation updates, translations etc.: throughout the year

Workshops & Talks

run 3 or more workshops
- 1 workshop in a community living close to a Uranium/Thorium or rare earth mine
do an open online talk (e.g. apply for CCC's annual congress RC3 call for proposals)

Milestones:
throughout the year (hands-on DIY workshops difficult to plan due to COVID-19)

Logbook

June 2021

On June 16, I was invited by Rafael Ballabriga, detector chip designer from CERN, to give an online seminar within the framework of the Spanish ADMIRA education project. About 25 high-school students and physics teachers from Barcelona participated. One student did a short presentation about his school project: he built the DIY Particle Detector, designed his own metal enclosure in the 3D CAD program SolidWorks and created CNC manufacturing files for it. He also took several measurements of different sources of radioactivity and compared them with more advanced pixel detectors (which in principle, operate very similar to the low-cost diodes). Short Twitter thread about the students' talk.

On 18/19. June, the final presentation of the Fellow FreiesWissen Program 2020 is happening. A wrap-up and summary of my whole program experience will follow soon after. TBD

May 2021

In collaboration with a local Fablab/maker space Oberlab, another DIY workshop took place on 20/21. May in Gmund, while the COVID-19 cases were declining quickly thanks to the warm spring weather. This time it was divided into an online introduction by me on the first day, followed by a DIY workshop from the following morning until noon. In total 16 high-school students (age 16-17) built their own detector inside a tin box. As guides were present their physics teacher Frederik, Alexander and Heinz from Oberlab, and myself.

March 2021

A new version of the detector hardware was designed in KiCAD and submitted to JLCPCB where five new circuit boards were manufactured. Sneak peek tweet. The new board can host more than six times the number of diodes, compared to the original detector version, and they are still arranged in a compact rectangular matrix (2x2 versus 5x5). This will make the detector more sensitive to weaker sources of radioactivity. A new special feature, for detecting cosmic rays, has been introduced as well together with several circuit options that hopefully reduce the always present electronic noise of the charge-sensitive amplifier further.

Picture of the new hardware: The tiny black rectangle in the bottom left corner is one diode, next to it the amplifier chip, both in SMD version. The new circuit board prototype (front and back pictured) is optimized for automated low-cost manufacturing in the future, complementing the current DIY version of the detector. The grey square with 3 buttons and display is an M5 stack core module that is extended with a custom bottom module, hosting the new detector. The ESP32 inside the core module will communicate radioactivity measurements over Bluetooth to smartphones/laptops, turning the current DIY particle detector into a gadget-like device with a simplified and more streamlined user experience.

February 2021

On 13/14.2., the Winter School of the fellow program took place with the topic of science communication. My personal highlight was the session run by Kerstin Göpfrich & Étienne Serbe who both presented their own science communication projects.
Kerstin talked about her platform Ring-A-Scientist that allows school teachers to contact and 'hire' real scientists who are interested in giving classroom talks in front of students.
Étinenne reported experiences about his citizen science project called Hirnkastl where they do workshops for students with low-cost EEG devices. Since these devices are also quite sensitive and not always easy to operate, there are some similar challenges with the DIY particle detector units.

December 2020

Presentation of the whole project at the RC3 conference_ on 31.12.2020, the first online version of the annual CCC Congress in Germany:

From 30.11 through 7.12., 12 high-school students in Bonn built detectors together with their physics teacher. After the usual project introduction by myself, the physics teacher re-purposed three of his regular physics lessons during which I was present remotely in a video call for any kind of remote support and questions while the students built particle detectors.
Pictures from the workshop:

November 2020

Preparation and Hosting of First Online DIY Workshops

This was a trial of a novel workshop format part of the Science Days Digital 2020, to make the best out of COVID-19 related social distancing requirements. Participants were gathering locally in small groups and were then guided by me remotely via several video calls. The preparation was quite time-consuming and involved in terms of necessary communication and organization with teachers and FabLabs.
However, the success was worth the effort and the fellowship supported me to handle certain aspects more pragmatic than otherwise possible. For example, several hardware components had to be shipped quickly to several international destinations, which I paid myself in favor of fast shipping and easier procedures.

The open hardware community platform www.Kitspace.org supported these workshops and took this as an opportunity to offer its first complete hardware kits*: https://shop.kitspace.org/buy/electron-detector/

The two-page assembly guide PDF was improved and translated into German.

Also due to this occasion, corresponding software, a browser-based oscilloscope for recording detector data, was also updated and improved.

Documentation updates in the Wiki can be followed here.

In total, 30 teachers, students, makers, and enthusiasts took part and built the electron-detector variant of my open science hardware instrument during these online workshops.

Pictures from the DIY particle detector online workshop hosted at FabLab Munich, 24. November:

October 2020

Participation in the Fellow FreiesWissen 2020 program kick-off event on 16./17. October.

First dedicated meeting with co-mentee Ludmilla Figueiredo and our common mentor Johanna Havemann on 29. October.

Both events lead to the project planning listed at the top of this page.

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