Welcome to the Exciting World
of Cosmic Muons Images!
Muons produced by cosmic rays reaching the Earth’s upper atmosphere are used by scientists for the determination of the inner density distribution of massive objects. This method is called muon tomography and has applications in volcanology, archeology and industry!
Help scientists by identifying patterns and tracks of muons in the detectors. Your work will help in training algorithms to automatically identify these patterns instead of just trying to isolate lines.
Participate
Researchers working on Cosmic Ray Muon Imaging: Interdisciplinary studies with Geoscience and Archaeology have the goal to show how the technology developed to study fundamental physics can be applied to a series of topics that may have a significant impact on society ranging from volcano live monitoring to applications in archaeology or use for non- invasive and non-destructive control processes in the industry. The detection of muons after any type of target allows therefore the characterization of the distribution and the density of the matter inside the target, in a similar way medical imaging uses X-rays.
Become a Muon Hunter!
REINFORCE team developed a Zooniverse project called Cosmic Muon Images to give citizens the opportunity to contribute to the study of the inner structure of massive objects. Within this project you will work with real data from events taken by a mission of Diaphane collaboration at Apollonia where researchers tried to investigate the discovery potential of buried monuments in collaboration with geophysical techniques. You – as part of our research team and as a Citizen Scientist- can contribute to this activity by finding the proper particle tracks, helping to the optimization of the detectors.
If you want to learn more about the different topics behind Cosmic Ray Muon Imaging in a nutshell, here are some interesting videos for you to watch:
What is a muon?
How scientists see through walls using particles from space
Muons tomography of "La Soufrière", Guadeloupe
Nuclear Watch: Looking Inside Fukushima Daiichi with Muon Tomography (8/20/2014)
What is a muon and why should I care? (RT America)
How to make a cloud chamber
Muography: see inside the Great Pyramid of Giza (Secrets of the Dead PBS)
Muons can now be used to predict Volcanic Eruptions, Here’s how it works (Anton Petrov)
Better than X-Ray Vision: Muon Tomography-Breakthrough Junior Challenge 2020 (Justin Peng)
You don’t know what to do? Don’t worry! There is a detailed step-by-step tutorial for every stage of Cosmic Muon Images.
Zooniverse project which pops up after you click on the stage you want. The tutorial remains available on the right side of your screen at all times.
The project consists of two workflows. The “Introductory” workflow looks at simpler cases, where the computer proposes a track. The “FreeStyle” workflow looks at events where the proposition of a track becomes difficult for the machine but it should be easy for you if you spent some time in the “Introductory” workflow.
Here you can watch again the dedicated webinar produced by the REINFORCE team regarding Cosmic Ray Muon Imaging.
How to use cosmic rays in the study of geosciences and archaeology
Summary
The webinar, held on the 11th of May 2021, aimed to give an overview of the REINFORCE Cosmic Ray Muon Imaging Demonstrator, showcasing the role that citizens can play in helping perform inquiries at the interplay between cosmic ray research and its applications.
You will learn:
- How citizens can play an active role in the advance of ground-breaking research
- How the muography technique works
- How REINFORCE demonstrator about Cosmic Muons Images will be developed
- How the project will work to include diverse and underrepresented groups in science
Speakers
- Jacques Marteau (Deputy director of IP2I)
- Amélie Cohu (IP2I)
- Matias Tramontini (UNLP)
- Marina Rosas-Carbajal (IPGP)
- Antoine Chevalier (PULSALYS)
- Theodore Avgitas (IP2I)
Presentations of the Webinar can be found here:
https://www.reinforceeu.eu/events/webinars/how-use-cosmic-rays-study-geosciences-and-archaeology
Are you ready? Join the rest of the Muon Hunters on Zooniverse here.
Would you like to ask something? The REINFORCE team is at your disposal.
There is also a discussion platform on Cosmic Muon Images Zooniverse project here where you can discuss with other citizen scientists.