oldest CERN oscilloscope.
Johnson 124-0111-001
<3> variable resistors.
<2> photomultiplier tubes. A device to convert light into an electric signal (the name is often abbreviated to PM). Photomultipliers are used in all detectors based on scintillating material (i.e. based on large numbers of fibres which produce scintillation light at the passage of a charged particle). A photomultiplier consists of 3 main parts: firstly, a photocathode where photons are converted into electrons by the photoelectric effect; secondly, a multiplier chain consisting of a serie of dynodes which multiply the number of electron; finally, an anode, which collects the resulting current.
The 3.70 metre Big European Bubble Chamber (BEBC) was dismantled on 9 August 1984. One of the biggest detectors in the world, it produced direct visual recording of particle tracks. 6.3 million photos of interactions were taken with the chamber in the course of its existence.
Model F-8A. Used to mesure magnetic fields.
Before the invention of wire chambers, particles tracks were analysed on scanning tables like this one. Today, the process is electronic and much faster. Bubble chamber film - currently available - (links can be found below) was used for this analysis of the particle tracks.
LSD= spiral digital reader
Gargamelle was the name given to a big bubble chamber built at the Saclay Laboratory in France during the late 1960s. The experiment ran at CERN from 1970 - 1976 and in 1973 found the first experimental evidence of the particles responsible for transmitting the weak force. The weak force, one of the 4 fundamental interactions at work in the universe, has long been the subject of research at CERN. The force is responsible for radioactivity and is the reason why the sun shines. Gargamelle observed what is known as neutral currents, the process of a neutrino and electron transforming into a muon and a neutrino by exchanging an electrically neutral force carrier. The interaction was triggered by a beam of neutrinos and recorded by photographing the trail of bubbles left behind in the freon that filled the experiment's main chamber. Gargamelle has been conserved and is now displayed in the Microcosm garden.