Cosmic Bitcasting

Cosmic Bitcasting is a collaboration between Afroditi Psarra and experimental physicist Cécile Lapoire on creating a wearable cosmic ray detector. The project was developed during a one-month residency at ETOPIA Center for Art and Science in Zaragoza, in the context of the exhibition REVERBERADAS.

Week I

During the first week of the residency we experimented with textile materials and worked with two Arduino compatible DIY radiation detector kits using GM tubes:
http://brohogan.blogspot.com.es/search/label/Geiger%20Counter
http://www.rhelectronics.net/store/radiation-detector-geiger-counter-diy-kit-second-edition.html
Based on these DIY geiger counters, as well as the open-source project of Juliana Cherston - a student at the MIT Medialab we designed our circuit schematic and fabricated the first prototype of the detector on neoprene fabric using wires and the couch stitching technique.

Week II

The second week at Etopia was dedicated to testing the first prototype and designing the wearable interface. During our tests with the oscilloscope, we observed a sudden cut in the HV (high voltage) boost converter part of our circuit that was probably due to some of the components failing as we had replaced three 2N3904 transistors with another NPN general-purpose low-power amplifying transistors that could not convert our 3.3V input into the required 400-500V for the GM tubes to work.

Because the space that we were working didn't have the necessary safety measures in order to work with high voltage we decided to use a Geiger Counter kits for the garment itself. So we focused on creating the wearable circuit and designing the interactions. For our wearable circuit we used a Lilypad Arduino 328 microcontroller, High Flex 3981 7x1 Copper bare conductive thread from Karl Grimm, Pure Copper Polyester Taffeta Fabric by Less EMF, white SMD LEDs, a coin cell vibration motor and an IRL3103 MOSFET with a 100 Ohm resistor to drive the motor.

Week III

On the third week of the residency, we redesigned our open-source cosmic ray detector and created a second prototype using neoprene as the base and the copper conductive fabric (with heat bonded adhesive) for the circuit traces which we cut using a vinyl cutter. After cutting we ironed the traces on the neoprene and we soldered all the components (this time having all the correct transistors). After testing it a couple of times and tweaking the pot that controls the voltage that is sent to the GM tubes we managed to have our detector working. In this case, the detector works exactly as the Geiger Counter kits with the difference that now we are using two tubes (connected to D2 and D3 at the Arduino board).

When printing the values if we manage to get "a synchronized hit" between the two tubes, we have a 75% probability of having detected a muon (secondary particle produced by the collision of cosmic rays with the Earth's atmosphere). It is important to point out that we did not manage to get a synchronized hit during our tests, but also the detector is designed to be mounted on the back of a garment, and having the GM tubes on top of the other would make it more likely to have a synchronized hit.

Week IV

On the last week of the residency, we made a new addition to the wearable - we incorporated an XBee Series 2 antenna in order to be able to capture the detection data and save them locally to a computer in Etopia so that at the end of the Reverberadas exhibition - on September 2016 to upload them on a database, accessible by anyone interested in using them for research purposes, visualization or sonification.

Towards the end of the residency we had the opportunity to do some photo and video documentation through the lens of the very talented filmmaker Despina Economopoulou.

Exhibitions

2017

ISWC Design Exhibition The 21st International Symposium on Wearable Computers Maui, Hawaii, USA. Chaired by Galina Mihaleva.

Alchemists of Art and Science, Ars Electronica Center Linz, Austria. Curated by Kristina Maurer.

2016

Human Factor - Endless Prototyping, organized by Ars Electronica at DRIVE - Volkswagen Group Forum in Berlin, Germany. Curated by Martin Honzik.

Reverberadas Etopia - Center for Art and Technology in Zaragoza, Spain. Curated by Fermín Serrano and organized as part of the European Digital Art and Science Network.