Improving Undergraduate Labs via Cyber-enabled Instruction and Remote Instrument Control

Suny At Stony Brook, Stony Brook NY

Investigators

Abstract

Physics (13) This project makes a major device, the Stony Brook Tandem Van de Graaff accelerator, accessible to students and educators through both on-site and remote access and allows its use for a wide variety of applications ranging from anthropology (using 14C dating techniques) through nuclear physics. Using video-conference-based tools, students have the opportunity to study nuclear collisions by taking virtual control of a functioning nuclear accelerator and its associated detectors. Among other experiments, students are able to conduct neutron threshold studies, observe resonance states in (p,n) reactions, study heavy-ion reactions, and perform discrete gamma ray experiments. Because the device is also able to make accelerator mass spectrometry measurements, the long-range facility plan is to perform 14C dating to determine the age of biological materials (currently available), detect 26Al (possibly associated with Alzheimer's disease), and measure 41Ca from bones, 36Cl from ice cores, ground water, and glacially-cleaved mountain tops, and 129I from fossil fuel reserves. While the primary focus of the current project is undergraduate education, the accelerator is also available to the pre-college and graduate communities.