diy Physics Blog

EG&G SPCM-AQR-13-FC Single Photon Counting Module on eBay (no relation to seller)

David Prutchi — Tue, 14 May 2013 11:41:28 +0000

I HAVE NO RELATION TO SELLER – Just passing along in case someone is interested. eBay item number 271206242864: “The EG&G (or Perkin Elmer) SPCM-AQR is a self-contained module which detects single photons of light over the wavelength range from 400 nm to 1060 nm and sensitivity which often outperforms PMTs. The option 13-FC indicates

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Original Source for Flyback Driver Hack?

David Prutchi — Wed, 08 May 2013 13:55:11 +0000

One of my all-time favorite circuits is the the following DC-to-AC inverter (click diagram to enlarge) based on an old color TV flyback: In this AC power supply, a push-pull oscillator drives a TV flyback transformer from an old color TV (a flyback without embedded tripler). The well-known hack is that the original primary of the

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Fair Sampling Loophole Closed for Test of Violation of Bell’s Inequality

David Prutchi — Thu, 25 Apr 2013 15:14:11 +0000

A very interesting article by Bernhard Wittmann, Sven Ramelow, Fabian Steinlechner, Nathan K Langford, Nicolas Brunner, Howard M Wiseman, Rupert Ursin,and Anton Zeilinger, entitled “Loophole-free Einstein–Podolsky–Rosen experiment via quantum steering” appeared in the Nature’s New Journal of Physics, Volume 14, May 2012. This paper describes a Bell’s Inequality Violation experiment in which the “fair sampling”

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Loved the Book “How the Hippies Saved Physics” by David Kaiser

David Prutchi — Tue, 23 Apr 2013 15:06:59 +0000

I just finished the book ”How the Hippies Saved Physics” by David Kaiser and absolutely loved! The book was fun and immensely educational regarding the seemingly unlikely seed of modern-day quantum information theory. I must confess that when I first saw the book on the shelf at my local Barnes & Noble I dismissed it as yet another

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Air to Ground Quantum Key Distribution Achieved

David Prutchi — Wed, 10 Apr 2013 20:28:16 +0000

From Phys.org: “A team of German physicists has successfully demonstrated an ability to perform quantum key distribution (QKD) exchange between an airplane in flight and a ground station, paving the way perhaps to the same kinds of communications between satellites and ground stations which could lead to a global quantum based secure communications network. The

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Using Surplus Photonis XP2422/SN PMTs in Scintillation Probes

David Prutchi — Tue, 09 Apr 2013 03:08:43 +0000

We prepared a short note on how to build a dynode voltage divider network for inexpensive surplus XP2422/SN photomultiplier tubes. The XP2422/SN PMT is especially suited for gamma-ray spectral analysis when coupled to a NaI(Tl) scintillation crystal because of its high pulse-height resolution (PHR). The XP2422/SN is available from Sphere Research in Canada. The surplus

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Schematics for Fast Pulse Amplifier for Macroscopic Entanglement Detection

David Prutchi — Sun, 07 Apr 2013 18:46:49 +0000

A recent paper entitled ”Displacing entanglement back and forth between the micro and macro domains” discusses the experimental possibility of displacing quantum entanglement into the domain where it involves two macroscopically distinct states, i.e. two states characterized by a large enough number of photons. Specifically, the authors describe the process by which they start with two entangled spatially separated

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In Memoriam – Dr. Akira Tonomura (1942-2012)

David Prutchi — Wed, 03 Apr 2013 02:24:18 +0000

We recently learned the sad news that Dr. Akira Tonomura - a truly great experimentalist – passed away on May 2, 2012 during the course of treatment on pancreatic cancer. We have been great admirers of Dr. Tonomura. Our blog’s banner is a cartoon representation of an experimental setup developed by Dr. Tonomura, through which in 1986 he

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Construction of a d.i.y. Thermoelectrically-Cooled Photomultiplier Tube (PMT) Housing

David Prutchi — Mon, 01 Apr 2013 01:23:31 +0000

The photomultiplier tubes (PMT) is the workhorse detector in particle physics and many other fields that require detection of light at extremely low levels. However, the long-wavelength response of PMTs is not only low because of low quantum efficiency, but also because thermionic emission at room temperature causes swamps low-level signals with noise. Reducing dark counts

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diy Scintillation Probe for Ludlum Ratemeters Using Surplus XP3312/SQ PMT

David Prutchi — Fri, 22 Mar 2013 22:53:33 +0000

Ludlum general-purpose ratemeters are professional-grade instruments that are available on the secondary market at affordable prices. They are compatible with a wide variety of probes, making them a great choice for educators, surveyors, and advanced amateur users. However, probes for Ludlum ratemeters are often as expensive as the meter instrument itself, making it worthwhile

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