Mike's Lab Notebook
From MariachiWiki
[edit] Scintillators, Scintillators, Scintillators...July 16th - Setting up Scintillators for BNL with Dima and Dr. Spahn. Starts at 9 PM Research:
[edit] July 16, 2007What an amazing day. Today Pat and I built FIVE scintillators all on our own with the help of Dr. Spahn and Jack. Using the different parts of a scintillator we were able to create five finished ones. These scintillators will be installed at Brookhaven labs later on for people to view the work of mariachi first hand. It was a great experience to learn how the scintillators REALLY work. And a direct quote from the man, Dr. Spahn himself, "I feel that it is very important that you understand how your apparatus works before you begin research."
[edit] July 17, 2007Today we started to plateau the five scintillators. Since we had no clue which scintillators ran at what voltage we had to start from scratch. We placed three scintillators, one on top of the other and ran the DAQ program to see which voltage the middle scintillator was most efficient at. This voltage was not right at all but just a rough estimate so we had some place to start. We had to do this to all five scintillators. This took a very long time and was very boring but it needed to be done. One of the scintillators seems to be a little light sensitive. It needs to be tested and looked at with an oscilloscope to see what the problem is. [edit] July 18, 2007Today Mike finished the plateauing of the 4 working scintillators. He then used the approximate voltages to calculate the different resistors that would be needed. After calculating the resistors and testing them to make sure they worked he placed two of them in the coincidence box and connected the two corresponding scintillators up to the box. He then placed a scintillator without a resistor in between the two other scintillators to find a more exact voltage to run the unknown scintillator at. He were able to find these more precise voltages for two of the four working scintillators. The one scintillator was still acting light sensitive today so Dr. Spahn and Mike connected that scintillator to an oscilloscope and saw weird results. The signals were periodic and big. When we shut off the power the signal continued to be observed. We believe it is acting as an antenna to a nearby frequency. We will open up the box and try to repair it tomorrow. [edit] July 19, 2007Today Dr. Spahn and Mike helped Jack catch up on some work. They worked with the gun cases and made them usable by MARIACHI. They had to cut the foam inside the case and drill the holes for the outputs. They did it an amazing in 3 hours. After that they talked to Dr. Marx about doing a week long study on placing scintillators outside and recording data in collaboration with Matt and Matt before they leave. After this they went up and helped Jack create the panels for the new voltage monitor which will be used in some of scintillator cases. Dr. Spahn wants Mike to do some work with cosmic rays and atmospheric pressure. They will talk tomorrow. Pat has stopped coming so Dr. Spahn and Mike have continued on without him. [edit] July 20, 2007Today Dr. Spahn and I decided that I should do a small research project over the next month. We decided to do the affect of atmospheric pressure on Cosmic Ray count. It's a nice easy project and data is readily available. I read a couple articles online about research that had been done on this topic to get a better understand and to see the conclusions that I should be matching with my research. Dr. Spahn also challenged me to think about the affect of atmospheric pressure on high energy showers. [edit] July 23, 2007Dr. Spahn talked to me about how I should go about my research on Atmospheric pressure and cosmic ray count. I showed him the papers I read and the research I had done over the weekend. We talked about possible reasons for a decrease in count rate per mm of hg. (about 1.5%)He then gave me the data files from the rocky point array and the time stamp data. I then learned how to import this data into excel and to make it recognize different inputs as the data or time. We then helped Matt and Matt get the apparatus ready for the roof research. We are placing an array on the lab roof to see if the lab is experiencing a shielding effect. [edit] July 24, 2007Today Dr. Spahn gave me the data files for the count rates from the Rocky Point array and asked me to go through them and see if I can spot any weird rates or maybe zero counts that can't be explained since such observations have been seen before with the use of the DAQ program. I also showed him the weather site where I planned to get my pressure data from. He approved and I started throwing data into an excel spreadsheet. Later we helped Matt and Matt with placing an array on the roof of the lab. I carried the detectors and wires up the ladders. Rich and Dima also helped. We began having troubles with the software and at the time of my departure the problems had not been resolved.
[edit] July 26, 2007Dr. Spahn and I tried to fix the detector that was acting funny. We had to redo all the solder joints. However it still acted funny with extremely high noise rates. The efficiency was more or less normal though so we I made a efficiency curve and we plan to use it for the Brookhaven array. I then made efficiency curves for the last two detectors. After this I started to import pressure and count data into an excel spreadsheet for an easier way to analyze. I have a lot of data to sift through so this should keep me busy for a couple of days. [edit] July 29, 2007I have been working on importing the pressure and count data into an excel spreadsheet. This is a time consuming process taking me about 20 minutes per date to import. [edit] July 30, 2007Continued to import data. [edit] September 28, 2007Now that I can readily import data and organize data at a quicker pace, I am now able to put some analysis together. I am almost done organzing 5 dates from june 2007. I then plan to create graphs and analyze data. I need to do some calculations regarding the shape of the scintillator and expected count rate. |
