Cloud Chamber — Observe Cosmic Rays & Radioactive Decay in Real Time

Look at your hand and imagine the cosmic rays passing through it right now. With this cloud chamber, you can see them.

A diffusion cloud chamber maintains a supersaturated alcohol vapour layer just above a cold surface. When a charged particle — an alpha particle, beta particle, or cosmic ray muon — passes through, it ionizes the vapour and leaves a visible white trail, exactly like a jet contrail but at the subatomic scale. You are watching individual particles from outer space.

What you see:

• Straight, thick tracks — alpha particles from natural radioactive decay
• Curved, thin tracks — beta particles and electrons
• Long straight tracks — cosmic ray muons passing through from space
• Forked tracks — particle collisions and decays

Includes: Acrylic chamber · Peltier cooling element (no dry ice needed) · Power supply · Isopropyl alcohol · LED illumination · Instruction guide

The same technology used in the discovery of the positron, the muon, and kaons.