Projects

Various projects related to cosmic rays and air showers in the world

School-based Project

NALTA Home Page
NALTA is a collaboration of experimental groups in Canada and the United States engaged in the study of high energy cosmic rays.  What makes NALTA unique is the involvement of high-schools and colleges  in this endeavor.  Teachers and students actively contribute to the physics research while learning about an exciting area of modern science.

ALTA Home Page
The Alberta Large Area Time coincidence Array (ALTA) is a collaborative project, involving the University of Alberta and provincial high schools, to search for very large area (~30,000 km²) correlations between the arrival times of cosmic ray showers observed at ndividual detector sites.

California HIgh school Cosmic ray ObServatory CHICOS
This is a collaborative project involving Caltech, Cal State Northridge, UC Irvine, and local high school physics teachers to site an array of particle detectors at high schools in the Los Angeles area.

Cosmic Ray Obervatory Project (UNL)
Department of Physics and Astronomy, University of Nebraska-Lincoln
CROP is a statewide outreach project whose goal is to involve Nebraska high school students, teachers, and college undergraduates in a multi-faceted, hands-on research effort to study extended cosmic-ray air showers.

SALTA Cosmic Ray Physics with School-Based Detector Networks
The SALTA project plans to set up a cosmic ray detector network in collaboration with secondary schools in and around the Roaring Fork Valley, in Colorado. The project is part of the education effort associated with the Snowmass 2001 Summer Study on the Future of Particle Physics, to be held in early July, 2001.

WALTA Home Page
WAshington Large Area Time coincidence Array is a project to investigate the highest energy cosmic rays with the participation of middle and high school students and teachers throughout the Seattle area.

CosRayHS Cosmic Ray Detectors in High Schools
A small group of physicists at the above institutions is exploring how best to incorporate the exciting idea of cosmic ray detectors in high schools into actual learning of high school students in a natural way such that the students and high school teachers take some ownership of the project, while at the same time organizing any information received in such a way that it can be correlated with information from other sites, locally or even nationally.

Research Projects

HiRes - The High Resolution Fly's Eye Cosmic Ray Detector
Extremely high energy cosmic rays are some of the most enigmatic particles to be found in nature. The HiRes Collaboration is studying cosmic rays above 10¹⁷eV to try and answer some of the questions that surround these rare particles.

Pierre Auger Observatory
The purpose of the Pierre Auger Project and Observatory is to study the masses of ionizing radiation, cosmic rays, which are constantly striking the earth.

Astrophysics Group, Adelaide
The group here is mainly concerned with high energy cosmic ray and gamma-rays, and does both experimental and theoretical work.

The cosmic ray muon detector is operating for teaching purposes. It monitors solar weather by finding the muon rate every 15 minutes.

University of Chicago Neutron Monitor
The purpose of the neutron monitor is to detect, deep within the atmosphere, variations of intensity in the interplanetary cosmic ray spectrum. Interactions of the primary cosmic rays with the atmosphere produce, among other things, a lower energy secondary nucleonic component consisting of nucleons (expand image at left), in particular neutrons that are not slowed by ionization loss, These secondaries fall in the energy range of a few hundred MeV up to about one GeV.

The High Energy Astrophysics Group at Leeds University
The Pierre Auger Observatory: The group was one of the first to become involved in the development of the next generation of ultra high energy (>10²⁰ eV) air shower arrays. Construction of this giant observatory began on 17th March 1999 and will cont inue until 2003.

The South Pole: From 1986 the group has been operating Cosmic Ray detectors at the Earth's geographic South Pole.

Haverah Park, located 17 miles north of Leeds on the Yorkshire moors. For two decades it was home to one of the world's largest and most sophisticated air shower arrays and during the 1980s a smaller gamma ray telescope.

HIGH-ENERGY ASTROPHYSICS BALLOON FLIGHT
This project aims to produce one of the first large-diameter (radius of about 1 meter) balloon-borne telescopes for making optical images.

AMANDA (Antarctic Muon and Neutrino Detector Array)
AMANDA is a detector being constructed at the South Pole, whose purpose is to observe high-energy (~ 1 TeV or 10¹² electron volt) neutrinos from astrophysical point sources.

South Pole Air Shower Experiment
SPASE is a large-area air shower array established at the geographic South Pole for the detection of cosmic rays with primary energies above 50 TeV.

The Cosmic Web
On October 15, 1991, the University of Utah's Fly's Eye cosmic ray detector at Dugway recorded the most energetic cosmic ray ever detected anywhere in the world.

Air Shower Division Homepage
•Telescope Array - The Highest Energy Particle Astrophysics & Very High Energy (VHE) Gamma Ray Astronomy
•AGASA (Akeno Giant Air Shower Array) - The Highest Energy Particle Astrophysics
•CANGAROO - Very High Energy (VHE) Gamma Ray Astronomy

AGASA (Akeno Giant Air Shower Array)
We constructed a very large surface array at the Akeno Observatory (35^o 47' N, 138^o 30' E) to study origin of extremely high energy cosmic rays. This array is called the Akeno Giant Air Shower Array (AGASA) .

Nuclear Physics Laboratory
Department of Physics, Faculty of Science, Okayama University
• An Altazimuthal Counter Telescope with a Magnet Spectrometer Tracing Cygnus X-3
• The Observation of Extensive Cosmic Ray Air Showers
• Searching for super slow massive particle by using TL sheets

Orbiting Wide-angle Light collectors (OWL)
An Earth Orbiting System to Study Air Showers Initiated by >10¹⁹ eV Particles

The Milagro Gamma Ray Observatory
Milagro, the Spanish word for miracle, is a new type of astronomical telescope. Like conventional telescopes, Milagro is sensitive to light but the similarities end there. Whereas "normal" astronomical telescopes view the Universe in visible light, Milagro "sees" the Universe at very high energies. The "light" that Milagro sees is about 1 trillion times more energetic than visible light.

The MILAGRO Experiment
MILAGRO consists of a large man-made pond filled with detectors. When a VHE gamma ray enters the earth's atmosphere, it interacts producing new particles which in turn interact themselves producing even more particles.

Home page of the IUPAP Commission on Cosmic Rays (C4)
The Commission on Cosmic Rays (C4) of the International Union of Pure and Applied Physics (IUPAP) was established in 1947 with the mandate to promoteinternational collaboration in all areas of cosmic ray research.

Get a taste of being an astrophysicist!

ASPIRE - In Search of Cosmic Rays
Astrophysics Science Project Integrating Research and Education
In Search of Cosmic Rays: Investigations into the Origin of Cosmic Rays

A list of early labs. Written to Sun's Microsystems initial version of Java (1.02), they can run natively on any java enabled browser.

Milagro Animations
The pages contain QuickTime movies that visualize computer simulations of Extensive Air Showers (EAS) and how EAS interact with the Milagro detector. These movies are intended as a tool to help researchers and students conceptualize the development of Extensive Air Showers and how they can interact with a ground based water Cherenkov detector.

DePauw - Purdue KASCADE VHE Air Shower Simulations
VHE Air Shower Simulations

What is Cosmic Ray?

Cosmic Rays
SNR and Cosmic Ray Acceleration
Cosmic Ray Astronomy Satellites & Missions
Ask a High-Energy Astronomer: Cosmic Rays
Cosmic and Heliospheric Learning Center -- Home Page
Cosmic Rays
Cosmic rays - A-Z Science - Homework Help - Discovery Channel School
Cosmic Rays -- from Eric Weisstein's Treasure Trove of Physics

Articles

Articles from scientific magazines on cosmic rays

Scientific American: Article: Cosmic Rays at the Energy Frontier: January 1997
These particles carry more energy than any others in the universe. Their origin is unknown but may be relatively nearby
by James W. Cronin, Thomas K. Gaisser and Simon P. Swordy

Scientific American: Feature Article: Cosmic Rays at the Energy Frontier: Magnificient Cosmos: March 1998
These particles carry more energy than any others in the universe. Their origin is unknown but may be relatively nearby
by James W. Cronin, Thomas K. Gaisser and Simon P. Swordy

Scientific American: Feature Article: Gamma-Ray Bursts: Magnificient Cosmos: March 1998
New observations illuminate the most powerful explosions in the universe
by Gerald J. Fishman and Dieter H. Hartmann

Scientific American: Science and the Citizen: COSMIC POWER: January 1999
Superenergetic cosmic rays could reveal the unification of the forces of nature
by George Musser

Scientific American: Feature Article: Floating in Space: November 1999
Balloons offer scientists a low-cost, quick-response way to study the upper reaches of Earth's atmosphere and those of other planets
by I. Steve Smith, Jr., and James A. Cutts

Scientific American: Feature Article: Counting Particles from Space: February 2001
Shawn Carlson explains how to build a cosmic-ray telescope

What is Gamma Ray Burst (GRB)?
How is it related to Cosmic Ray?

Gamma-ray Bursts
Imagine the Universe! Theatre
Gamma-ray Astronomy Satellites & Missions
Ask a High-Energy Astronomer: Gamma-ray Bursts
Imagine the Universe: Gamma-Ray Bursts
Images from High Energy Astrophysics

What is Supernova Remnant (SNR)?
How is it related to Cosmic Ray?

X-ray Astronomy: Supernovae and their remnants - Introductory
Supernovae
X-ray Astronomy Satellites & Missions
Imagine the Universe! Supernova Remnants
Ask a High-Energy Astronomer: Supernovae and Their Remnants
Supernova Remnants

Presentation speeches and biographies of contributing scientists

Physics 1936
Victor Franz Hess
- "for his discovery of cosmic radiation"
Carl David Anderson
- "for his discovery of the positron"

Physics 1948
Patrick Maynard Stuart Blackett
- "for his development of the Wilson cloud chamber method, and his discoveries therewith in the fields of nuclear physics and cosmic radiation"

Physics 1958
Pavel Alekseyevich Cherenkov
Il'ja Mikhailovich Frank
Igor Yergenyevich Tamm
- "for the discovery and the interpretation of the Cherenkov effect"

A review on the building blocks of our universe, which includes the constituent of cosmic rays.

Contemporary Physics Education Project (CPEP)
Welcome to the Particle Adventure
The ABC's of Nuclear Science
Updating the Periodic Table

What is Cerenkov Radiation?
How does it help in detecting cosmic rays?

Cerenkov Radiation
Cerenkov Radiation.

How can we measure time precisely?
How can we locate ourselves accurately?

地球物理及授時服務組網頁主目錄
香港天文台 地球物理及授時服務組網頁主目錄

Britannica.com Features Archive - Clockworks: From Sundials to the Atomic Second
What is time?

Beyond Discovery, The Global Positioning System: The Role of Atomic Clocks
GPS was made possible by a combination of scientific and engineering advances, particularly development of the world's most accurate timepieces: atomic clocks that are precise to within a billionth of a second.

The Global Positioning System
These materials were developed by Peter H. Dana, Department of Geography, University of Texas at Austin, 1994. These materials may be used for study, research, and education in not-for-profit applications.

International GPS Service (IGS)
The International GPS Service (IGS), along with a multinational membership of organizations and agencies, provides GPS orbits, tracking data, and other high-quality GPS data and data products on line in near real time to meet the objectives of a wide range of scientific and engineering applications and studies.

University NAVSTAR Consortium (UNAVCO)
UNAVCO is a consortium of 100 international universities and laboratories joined to promote the use of the Global Positioning System (GPS) for high-accuracy geosciences research. GPS is used for the study of diverse Earth science problems ranging from plate kinematics, earthquake processes and volcanoes, to sea level change and the atmosphere. UNAVCO supports both university-based activities and a central Facility that provide GPS technology capability to the broad GPS user community and specific project support to investigators funded by the National Science Foundation (NSF) and National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA).

The Science of Timekeeping - HP Application note 1289
• UTC: Official World Time
• GPS: A Time Distribution Utility
• Time: An Historical and Future Perspective
• From Laboratory to Practical Use
• Broad Applications Across Society

Astronomy Picture of the Day

Astronomy Picture of the Day Search Results for "cosmic ray"

Astronomy Picture of the Day Search Results for "gamma ray burst"

Astronomy Picture of the Day Search Results for "Supernova Remnant"