Cosmic Ray Astronomy

This project deployed 16 individual cosmic ray detectors on the banks of the Elder Park foreshore in Adelaide. Supported by Splash Adelaide 2017 and is built in collaboration with Darren Curtis an artist-musician from Sacred Resonance.

When the public came to visit this installation, they experience how cosmic rays are all around us and arrive in showers of particles. Each detector randomly twinkles with colours and sounds triggered by cosmic rays. The experience not unlike colourful wind chimes.

However, as cosmic rays arrive in showers of particles, some of these detectors will trigger in unison and others randomly.  A similar experience to what can be witnessed in nature like the sounds of Cicadas or the flashing light of Fireflies, where both sound and light fade in and out from randomness to unison.

Cosmic Rays have been present throughout the entire evolutionary history of life on our planet and so this display reinforces our connection with the universe and the importance of science and understanding the natural world.

The project had no agenda other than the first of many thought-provoking art/science installations.  Which will provide an interesting window into the universe and the natural world around us, leaving the observer to form their own connections and conclusions.

Technical
Each detector in the array will produce a bright flash of one of 4 colours (red, green, blue or white). In the same manner, one of 3 musical notes ( e.g. C, F, G or other notes) or all 3 notes together depending on the direction and angle of an ionising particle called a muon passes through two or more Geiger–Müller tubes simultaneously.  A combination of radiation copper shielding and coincidence detection methods were used to filter local background radiation.

The system used for playing sounds and other IoT functions utilises the latest Raspberry Pi Zero W and the code was developed by Paul Schulz.  The IoT setup was very successful with this arrangement and were able to stream live data to another computer where it was mapped into music using MAX/MSP software.