Mentors: Tony Spadafora & Alex Kim

Workshop Coordinator: Laurie Kerrigan

The LBNL Physics Division hosted its ninth “Physics In and Through Cosmology” workshop for QuarkNet Leadership teachers and high school students. The five day workshop from June 22 to June 26 was held at the Lawrence Berkeley Lab.  Ten science teachers participated. Five of the teachers have been active members of QuarkNet for five or more years. Three new teachers joined the group this year.  The QuarkNet Teachers and 42 students represented public and private high schools in the greater San Francisco Bay Area. 

The first day focused on getting all participants familiar with concepts & terms in particle physics & cosmology.  This was accomplished through “mini” lectures given by returning QuarkNet teachers & two LBL researchers: Alex Kim and Danny Mittelberger.

The daily format consisted of a hands-on warm-up activity, a morning scientist talk and an afternoon talk.  Between talks, groups worked on hands-on experiments (e.g. QuarkNet acitivty lead by Ken Cecire using data from ATLAS), discussed the lecture, and toured the ALS (Advanced Light Source) and Molecular Foundry research facilities.  Groups also designed & carried out experiments with Cosmic Ray Detectors.  Each group consisted of five to six students and one teacher. 

Teachers also meet with Ken Cecire over lunch on the second day to discuss QuarkNet.

Formal presentations included:

Tony Spadafora (LBL)                           - Welcome  from the Lab

 Marty White (LBL)                               - Safety talk    

Theresa Summer (QurkNet teacher)      - Conservation Laws, Gravity, Newton’s 3 & Vectors 

Alex  Kim (LBL)                                    - Introduction to the History of the Universe with                              

                                                                     Emphasis on Dark Matter & Dark Energy

Glen Melnik (QuarkNet teacher)            - General Theory of Relativity

Danny Mittelberger (LBL)                      - Introduction waves & applications with BELLA                             

Ray Adams (QuarkNet teacher retired)   -  Distance Ladders

Bryan Marten (QuarkNet teacher)           - Element Formation

Ian Hinchliffe (LBL)                               - ATLAS - Higgs and other LHC Physics 

Zach Marshall (Skyped from CERN)     - ATLAS video, questions & answers

Peter Sorensen (LBL)                              - Dark Matter and Detectors 

Ken Cecire (QuarkNet)                           - Get to know experiments & particles

                                                                   Rolling with Rutherford & Quark Puzzle,

                                                                   & Mass Calc. Z,  and W's and Z's in ATLAS Data   

Freija Descamps (LBL)                           - Neutrinos and SNO+      

Glen Melnik (QuarkNet teacher)             - Derivation of Special Theory of Relativity Equation

Phil Marshall (Stanford)                          - Mapping the Universe

Brian Hayden (LBL)                                - Supernova Cosmology and Dark Energy

Saul Perlmutter (LBL)                             - Surprise drop in

Blake Sherwin (LBL)                              - New CMB results

Carl Pennypacker (LBL)                          - Supernovea to FUEGO

Alex Kim, Freija Descamps, Brian Hayden,     - Panel Discussion

Tony Spadafora, Carl Pennypacker, Blake Sherwin

On the last day students completed a self- evaluation of how much they learned about science concepts during the workshop. They used a scale of 1 (nothing) to 5 (a lot).

3.72  Was the average for the overall category of Cosmology and Particle Physics.

Specific concepts within that category that received the highest gain were:

  3.88  Quantum fluctuations during inflation lead to stars & galaxies.

Some comments by the students and teachers include:

               Meeting Saul (Perlmutter) was also really cool.

Having so many physicists come to talk about their life & work was really great.

      They definitely confirmed what I want to pursue in the future!

I like everything about the workshop because I get to learn about the Universe, meet new

    people, learn science from many professionals, visit laboratories, have fun & get feed.

I learned much about physics and cosmology, especially particle physics. I learned how

    the fields of study are connected, what remains a mystery, and what experiments are

    underway to solve these mysteries.

I really enjoyed the style in which each of the topics was taught.  The amount I learned

    was much greater than the amount I usually learn in school.

It taught me that there is still so much we don’t know & that curiosity, interest is the way

     to find the path through life.

I enjoyed learning just for the sake of learning & curiosity.

I understand the science world better from hearing about current live research from

     working scientists.

      Teachers expressed their views and asked questions that provoked deep thoughts.

              I like the interactive activity, especially Rolling with Rutherford, QuarkNet puzzle

                         – educational & fun

              I like presentations from scientists on cutting-edge research.

Teacher                        High School

Purpose –The purpose of this experiment was for students to have hands on experience collecting & interpreting data from muon detectors. All students have had no previous experience using detectors. These detectors were supplied by Howard Matis of LBL.

Methods – After learning how to operate the detector, each of the 4 teams composed of 10 students, 2 teachers & a detector, choose one of the following investigations to determine the rate of flux of muon counts tilting the detector between 0 and 90 degrees from the horizontal.

There was a 5minute experiment of the paddles orientated horizontally, a 5 minute experiment of the paddles orientated vertically, and a 5 minute experiment orientated at approximately 45 degrees.

Data -   Orientation of paddles    Detector #1       Detector #2       Detector #3      Detector #4

                   Horizontal                       100                    78                 103                    78

Counts/

  Min.         Vertical                             23                     12                  23                      9

                  45 degrees                         70                      18                 72                     34

                   Shielding                         N/A                   N/A               87                     79      

Results  -  The data of each detector was written on the board & analyzed.  We discussed what causes the difference of these counts depending upon the orientation in a given detector.  Each group saw there was a much higher count when the paddles were orientated horizontally as opposed to vertically.  By seeing this difference it gave us confidence that we were detecting muons and not just electrical noise. There was also a discussion on why the two detectors had different counts. Then there was a detailed explanation on how voltage plays a role in the sensitivity of the paddles.  Too high of a voltage gives a runaway count, too low of a voltage gives no count.  Another detector was used to demonstrate when different voltages were applied to the paddles showing the difference of sensitivity to muon count. 

Meaning & future investigations - Cosmic rays have played a large role in the development of Particle Physics.  The muon as well as antimatter were first detected by cosmic ray investigations.

This activity gave the students a first-hand experience in understanding & working with particles. Working with detectors also helped the students understand the collection of subatomic particles on much larger scales such as in Sno+.

Further investigations could include different shielding materials, different elevations of detection, and different orientations such as East & West.

The pupose of this experiment is to determine if Moisture in the atmosphere will interfere with muon flux rates

It is hypothesized that water will interact with the muons and or slow down the weaker muons before that can be collected and counted. There as the moisture in the atmosphere increases it is hypothesized the muon counts will go down and negative correlation will exist.

In order to collect data, two scintillator paddles were stacked and placed on the 4th floor Of the Olin building at FIT in Melbourne Florida. The rate counts for the top and bottlom paddles were set at 20Hz and 23Hz. Once the rate counts were set, a histogram performance graph was run. Looking at he performancey graph for both paddles the bell shape curves were ideal directly on top of eachother. Once the Paddles were calibrated, an ST 3 30 command was inititated to collect muons for 30 minute intervals. Using the NOAA website and the location of FIT campus the Humidity and dewpoints were collected at the top of every hour. Total Muon counts for the paddles per hour were compared to the average dewpoint and humidity level in that same hour. The data was collected for a week and half every morning and every afternoon. The data was placed on an excel spreadsheet. Using the function tool a correlation coefficient was calculated. If th r-value is greater than an .81 -1.00 there is a positive correlation and is the r-value is a -.81 -1.00 there is a negative correlation. Any value between -.8 to +.8 will result in a non correlation.

In conclusion, after collecting 94 sample points, the r-value correlation coefficient for Humidity and Muon Flux was -0.84, meaning there was a slight negative correlation. Therefore, the data suggest that water in atmosphere seems to reduce the muon flux. In the research students would like to seal and submerge the paddles underwater or surrounded by water tanks. This will allow the students to reduce background noise while c
comparing total counts for each paddle to coincidence rates between the paddles.

The current project this summer is for the QuarkNet student to continue a data visualization web site that was started a summer ago by an intern that was working at the Sanford Underground Research Facility.  Data is collected by three underground weather stations using Campbell Scientific equipment.  The three weather stations are located at the 4850 level at SURF.  The student (W Smith)is being exposed to the Campbell Scientific software that will allow three data sets to be combined into one.  This data set is then imported into R studio and a script is being developed to visualize iteractivey with the data. Shiny is the reading the script and dynamically building a web page.