[UPDATED] radioactivity on video - just like inside chernobyl

[gronki1]

great video! I really liked it, I guess if I ever get a radioactive source I need to keep it away from my Nikon lol. There's something exciting about the fact that you can actually DESTROY something with the radiation by yourself, isn't it? :)

[ricktbdgc]

you know this chick is awesome in the sack

[quaxk]

could a thorium doped lens damage a camera sensor? I have 2 radioactive lens (rokkor 58mm f/1.2 and an old canon s.s.c. 35mm f/2), I'm a bit scared to use them after watching this :\

[bionerd23]

@quaxk

not really. only if you'd leave a film (!) in an old analog camera for a long time (weeks), it might get exposed by the radiation, and image quality will be reduced.

[utubekilledthevideo]

You need to watch some of the better documentaries on Chernobyl, and then you'l maybe realize you are toying with your future health.

[crashalaska86]

what about Samarium

[iliya1997]

2:23 is that mean that this meal very radioactive?

[megahosters]

If I took apart a smoke detector and put the Am-241 to my eyeball would I get cancer or die?

[CarnalDiafragma]

@megahosters You would get an ionized eye

[ms3bani]

think about space probes, they have to tolerate hundreds of thousands times more radiation and still have working CCDs!

[alfaradiation]

What was the activity of the Americium, I tried this with an CMOS camera, but the alpha from Am241 (37kBq) was not so intense probably because the CCD has bigger sensor area perhaps and diferent woking?

[caddotservices]

Amazing, pretty and scary at the same time ! Great video.

[thevectorfilms]

This is an awesome video.

"It's like a fucking blizzard!"

Ah, science.

[ovnismx]

This is very interesting, you can measure radiation with a webcam, ok i got it that you need to remove the plastic case but how you you make the grey background?

[bionerd23]

@ovnismx

by simply using it in the dark. ;)

if it wasnt just "dim lights" but instead "total darkness", i guess you'd even have a BLACK background! \o/

[ovnismx]

@bionerd23 thanks :)



[sleat]

Eeee, I just checked my antique WWII Swiss Officer's pocket watch, the "12" in the face of the mica window yields 500uSv/h from 1mm away, so must be alpha, but it's plenty of alpha! Do not eat pocket watch numerals, and air is your friend!

[sleat]

Ha, this takes me back to an 'accidental' production and analysis of ionizing radiation we did with a small tesla coil and a vacuum chamber while ago. Pumped down, and earthed a copper wire inside, and zapped thru the cover-bell-jar glass from the outside, while for some reason watching with night-vision tubes! At a set range of voltages and vacuums, the sparkles began!! Fun stuff, probably X-rays or weak gamma, given it came back thru the glass. Felt a bit sunburnt and fluey next day.

[jjovereats]

As of today, my Auntie Ann Cl*** (censored for privacy) peaked at 90 µSv/h on my Terra-P Geiger counter so many so many centimeters above the top-line of the buttock-crack.

[Gogluism]

Wow I really gotta try this with my old digital camera, I just need an uranium ore sample, I might buy it on eBay next month. I also want to buy a geiger counter and some more radioactive samples, any suggestions?

[lumabi25]

Thanks. Very interesting. Until now I hadn't seen that effect on modern CCD cameras, only ever on film such as the footage taken shortly after Chernobyl. Though when I was in the navy I remember seeing very clearly the effects from an operating radar, even though it was well overheard, but I digress.

[lollazers]

That's awesome. Did you remove the foil on the Am-241 source? In the US, the smoke detector cores have a gold foil layer (or something) on them. I've heard it kills the alpha output, but it didn't for Rutherford's gold foil experiment?

Also, I did try the ZnS phosphor screen thing, and didn't get very good results; maybe my screen was too thick or something as I know it works with a spinthariscope, but I couldn't see anything even with a generation 2 image intensification tube.

[bionerd23]

@lollazers

there's only a gold foil layer on the back, at least in the one i used. the front is "clean" and pure Am-241. :)

however, VERY thing gold foil (and other foils) are penetratable by alpha radiation, so it depends, i guess.

[scootergrisen]

Very good video. Your are good at this. The last source is crazy. I diddent know you could film that.

[triperman1]

идиоты взяли сломали стёклышко на матрице))))

[XQuantumRelativityX]

Awesome!

[BigBananaMan]

I just had a cool idea if you want to expand upon this. Leave the glass cover on the CCD and cover it with a phosphor coating so it will have a longer life while losing some resolution(optional). Then write or have somebody write a simple python script that counts "flashes" of data coming off the camera. If you have Linux you can run cat on the camera's location (probably /dev/video0) to see the raw data. Homemade scintillator counter! With added modules for graphing and averaging!

[bionerd23]

@BigBananaMan

ha, that's actually quite a cool idea!

however, i now have an actual scintillation device (NaI(Tl)), and i'm hoping to build a sound card spectrometer for it at some point. :P

[BigBananaMan]

@bionerd23 Sound card spectrometer? I'm sure I can wait for the video except for one detail.  I can't wait for a video! Could you elaborate? I've always known of spectrometers operating in the visible light range. Are you suggesting exposing samples to alpha particles and measuring the backscatter or perhaps bremsstrahlung? I'm not quite making the connection yet.

[bionerd23]

@BigBananaMan

physics.usyd.edu.au/~marek/pra­/

[yourTIV0]

Where do you get radioactive compounds like this 0.o

[patachu666]

@yourTIV0

القاعدة‎

[xXxmidgexXx]

lol i bet if you put that brown disc thing at the end on a geiger counter, it would be making a crapload of noise lol

[yeahyeya]

gay

[sirMAXX77]

what a difference from just that tiny piece of glass. good work.

[clony101]

where did u get the web cam all the ones ive tryed have a circle instead of a square and it is not posible to cut the glass

[ShadowSlayer103]

you know, I don't want to sound stupid (although, with a quite basic understanding of radiation, in this subject, I might as well be ), but I do not see anything other than a gray background, with a whole bunch of white dots at the end. Would you mind explaining what happened?

[bionerd23]

@ShadowSlayer103

did you try watching it in high quality, and maybe turning up your monitor's brightness? there are white pixel flashes to be seen throughout the whole video...

those flashes are ionizing radiation (alpha, beta, gamma radiation) from the radioactive sources hitting the camera, exciting the CCD basically like normal light does. however, due to the ionization capability (cont)

[bionerd23]

@ShadowSlayer103

(cont) (excitation = lifting electrons to higher orbitals, while ionization = knocking out electrons from the shell. to ionize instead of excite, the energy of the photon / particle must be greater than the binding energy of the electron) - especially that of the densely ionizing properties of the heavy alpha particles (it's a whole helium nucleus, two protons and two neutrons!), (cont)

[bionerd23]

@ShadowSlayer103 (cont) which also have energies in the mega-electronvolts energy - some pixels may get "hot", which is basically a short-circuit which causes a localized malfunction that is permanent... so the pixels stay white.

[viciokas1993]

Looks like those old movies, only with a gray background. Fairly impressive, Id love to do that, but I dont think radioactive compunds are legal in Belgium

[bionerd23]

@viciokas1993

yes they are. i know a few people from belgium and thus, i know there are exempt quantities (quantities that you can keep legally without having a license), just as in germany.

[fdrpyahoocom]

so....you have radioctive material in way u could do this don't you?

[Itzmyrave]

Hottest spot in Chernobyl was emittin 30000Roentgen an hour.

On the roof where BIO robots were used radiation levels were between 7000-15000 Roentgen an hour

[amatomicX]

Jesus ! look at this....fucking crazy ! LOL ! = ) I love it when you get excited and I'm glad you were enjoying yourself & having fun. Nice job doing "surgery " on your webcam, & excellent results !

[glaxko2]

right i love your videos.

don't wanna offend anyone or anything, but i just had to point out the extreme irony of a german joking about a nuclear holocaust (im german/irish and my mother is jewish).

[bionerd23]

why, what's wrong with holocaust? that's just a greek word meaning "the great destruction of life, especially by fire". same as the swastika is an ancient symbol that has been used thousands of years ago... however, people usually put these words / symbols in association with the horrors the nazis brought upon the world, that's true. it's not like the nazis invented any of that, though.

[glaxko2]

no, but they definately made those words / symbols represent the intense evil the nazis were responsible. I hope you do see the irony though..

[TheCaptainLulz]

@bionerd23 technically holocaust translates as burnt offering.

[extremisto47]

Did you Know what is it Chernobyl???

Inside Chernobyl you will burn out in one second, there is 1000 Rh/h

[bionerd23]

not really, just search youtube for "inside chernobyl". ;)

i admit it's pretty unhealthy to stay within the sarcophagus, though.

[KarbineKyle]

5/5! That is awesome! It looks like the background "snow" of a television when hit with the Alpha particles! I have a cheap web cam that's just lying around. I need to try this! I have quite a bit of radioactive materials, except, I don't have any disc sources yet. I do have pure U-238 metal (only 5 grams), and I have some old Radium bead tipped switches, which will give off a lot of Alpha, and Beta too as well as X-ray & Gamma photons. I really love the videos you post! Keep up the good work!!

[ScandalB52]

lol people out of plain ignorance ask me Are you making a bomb?and that is when I am studying Radiation,Nuclear and Radioactivity not all is for bombing it's helpful to try and eliminate Cancer and to make medicines and other helpful things,sure exposure is deadly but it has it's positives

[chao129]

Why does causing a nuclear holocaust bring you so much joy?

[profikebara]

This same what is happen with "dead" pixels of CCD detector,can be happen vith human body cells after radiation exposure.

[bionerd23]

yep, that is true. the same happens with free radicals in our body - thousands of times a day, our very DNA gets damaged.

good thing that - unlike a camera ccd - our body repairs those damages or, if they're severe, sends the cells into apoptosis. =)

[boxa888]

is that a electron beam at the end?? i couldnt figure out what it was?? awesome work, you are a real scientist!!! thanks so much!!!!

[bionerd23]

nope, alpha radiation - that's two protons and two neutrons together. :)

[Gheven1]

I like very much the way you act: you're only basing on science, not like irrational people who're living in scare tanks to their deep ignorance... Well done and many thanks for your very interesting videos! :-)

[bionerd23]

yeah, i'm pretty glad i was blessed with a systemizer brain, too... thanks for the flattery. ;-)

[Gheven1]

Well, being myself a "victim" of similar average-people's criticism every single day, I perfectly figure out your mood and I knew you needed a tiny flattery! ;-)

[mkrubsack]

This is really good!

[trinitrophenol]

Awesome video. Those heavy alphas can't penetrate matter well at all, but they're so much more ionizing when they do strike matter than betas or gammas (or x-rays ... which are really just gammas that come from non-nuclear processes).

[boxa888]

what i though gammas were different than xrays? i know they are in the same energy levels.

[bionerd23]

well, per definition, x-radiation is electron tube radiation (produced artificially) while gamma radiation is from radioactive decay, but i was more referring to the energy of the Ba-133 gammas; they're closer to the x-ray spectrum.

[vmelkon]

@bionerd23 That's not the definition of x-rays and gamma.

[dmarco1994]

good video u are a smart girl

[mike240se]

is that a smoke detector source opened?

[bionerd23]

yes.

[PCguy102]

You should do a long exposure (1-5 seconds) to get a nice effect of the particles striking the CCD

[bionerd23]

cannot do that with a webcam, but i did so with my digital camera, see my flickr page (address is on my channel) for details / the photos!

[theevilovenmit]

That was an awesome demonstration.

with some effort, you could create permanent images on a ccd using a perforated sheet of metal as a radiation mask, cross hairs or your signature for example.

[bionerd23]

ha, now thats a funny idea. i will sell webcams with my logo branded in them permanently... lol. awesome thinking there. ^_^

[Wizard4592]

Interesting video except the foul language.

[winnryautomail]

awesome experiment. you are one kool girl. lol.

[UAEchemist]

Also how did you remove the areas to expose the CCD ?

[bionerd23]

as i said, i removed the glass covering the CCD with a tiny grinding tool.

[UAEchemist]

Nice experiment. How did you manage to get a hold of the isotopes ?

[bionerd23]

some from household material, some from abandoned uranium mines, some from companys in the USA.

[noordwinter]

like a smoke alarm?

[bionerd23]

exactly

[JaksProductions]

your voice is diffirent then on the videoss

[bionerd23]

yeah, because i speak into a proper logitech USB microphone there, while on the other videos, i just recorded my voice onto the video with the digital camera('s microphone).

[Comptonscattering]

Well done, but do be careful handling those sources.

[fakenphoney]

ok what about after you handle these materials, don't you get the dust all over your clothes, shoes, etc...? you might end up eventually digesting it. Can you enlighten us on the handling procedures? I don't want to cramp your style or anything, I love your videos but safety is important :P

[bionerd23]

well, with the uranium ore, dust is an issue indeed and thus it should be handled carefully, ie. in a place that is easy to clean. the Ba133, Cs137, Sr90 are in expoxy source disks and pose no risk of contamination. the americium source is rather harmless as well, being embdedded in aluminium. there's no dust coming off of that.

i always clean my workspace as well as wash my hands thoroughly after handling material that poses a health risk due to contamination, like uranium ore or mercury.

[buZztiaan]

BOOM! :D great stuff :P

[bionerd23]

it's the webcam you once gave me finally put to use... <3 ;)

[buZztiaan]

sweet, nothing like good recycling :D

[fakenphoney]

is this not harmful to you too?

[bionerd23]

well, as for the beta and gamma radiation... in theory, yes, as any amount of ionizing radiation may just eventually be harmful and lead to mutation / cancer and stuff. but, the amount i am handling is very, very low (so called 'exempt quantities') and no acute or chronical effects on health can be linked to it.

the rather strong radiation in the end is alpha radiation, which cannot even penetrate skin or even a piece of paper, so its harmless outside the body.

[bionerd23]

yes, i do - a bullet with depleted uranium to the head. thats the only way to go for me. ^_^

[bionerd23]

still, if it was... say, 80% of a certain atom in my breathing air and another 20% of oxygen to go with it, i'd prefer helium over radon any day, as helium is harmless by itself - it doesnt do any damage to the lungs or your body in general.

as for nitrogen... well, i'm breathing a mixture that contains about 78% nitrogen at this very moment, and it doesnt do any harm to me, either. ;-)

...just pointing this out so ScreamingElectron doesnt get confused. =)

[bionerd23]

aw, i never heard of that game... i only played fallout 3. :-P

[bionerd23]

lol well, sure. ANY of that will kill you if you dont get any oxygen with it. you could inhale pure RADON for 20 minutes, too - you wouldnt have to worry about the radiation at all, because you'd be dead from a simple lack of oxygen. it's easier if you use two nitrogen atoms that are combined with an oxygen atom though, forming N2O - that'll be a narcotic gas and you wont feel that you are suffocating because you're high. =)

[kiIIamaim]

amazing

[Nby21Blog]

cool :D where can you buy those radiation sources? (is there a particular company or website where you could get those). And do you know a website where i could buy pure chemical subsatnces? (ex sulphur, carbon, aluminium power,etc) Thanks and keep up the good work !

[bionerd23]

nope, there's no website that just sells 'all things radioactive for your home experiments'. one has to use their mind and especially google. look at my 'a closer look at americium 241 from a smoke detector' video. got the hint? ;-)

chemicals are rather easy, too - just use google to find a shop near you. if you google in your language, that may just give you the best results.

[KrypticGuy666]

I need some depleted uranium for manufacturing of certain objects, can you help me in the finding of such material?

[bionerd23]

nope, sorry. i only have natural uranium ore.

[seneca67]

that is pretty cool, ty.

[ScreamingElectron]

Lol cool. yeah i've got an americium source thats been sitting at my desk wrapped in a small bit of plastic. I'm hoping that none of the Helium particles are finding their way into my lungs...

[bionerd23]

why? helium is a harmless gas that has been safely inhaled by many people, and is quite fun due to being lighter than air. :-)

alpha particles - as they are ejected from a decaying radionuclide's core - will go no further than two inches, anyway.

[polonium9]

radioactive snow MY FAVORITE

[Dharok60]

LOL like a fucking blizard lol

[mdain581]

justin you're a real character.

[sciencoking]

omg... my very first thought was ... HUH! OMGWTFBBQBACONTOTHEPOWEROF1241­28712398987129873

i was playing with another circuit while watching the video and i was so shocked that i burned out a potentiometer xD

now my room stinks terribly (that burned epoxy odor)

this is a fucking stron effect o_O even more than that lame proton beam :D

it´s awesome :D

astounding hiw thin that glass laver was and though it blocked ALL the alphas...

btw great work on the chip removing that sensitive part

[bionerd23]

lol, thanks - yeah, i am very suprised how many pixels this actually KILLED in such a short time... about two minutes, and hundreds of them are dead. this is worse than the proton beam it seems... o_O

PS: RIP poti -_-

[sciencoking]

yeah, and that at midnight... oh btw are you going to store the chip somewhere and do this again or did you already throw it away? ;-)

oh the potentiometer already was quite old... its time has come ^_^

who knows maybe it will work again tomorrow (that happened to several LEDs that were actually dead this morning... suddenly they started giving off a faint glow that got broghter and brighter and niw they work again o_O zombie-LEDs ftw

[sciencoking]

what the...? i seem to be tired... i don´t hit the right keys anymore :P

[bionerd23]

i'm going to store it until its really, really dead. dead as a parrot! and im going to take pictures for my flickr with it in a bit. ^_^

[sciencoking]

you actually see the quality of the video getting worse (pixels grow) is that possible? have a look...

[bionerd23]

lol yeah, i thought that was my fault, but it seems to be youtube's fault! it is fixed on my side now; try watching the video in high resolution (click the link at the bottom right to the video) or at least refresh it, it works for me since a few minutes.

[bionerd23]

yes, i see what you mean in the low resolution version... that sucks. i've added an annotation saying that users should watch it in high quality - that fixes the problem. please try it and get back to me, thanks. =)

[sciencoking]

yep, works :D k thx gnight ;-)

[bionerd23]

kthxbai!!!11

schlaf gut ;-)

[sciencoking]

you will not believe it but the potentiometer works again xDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDD­D

[bionerd23]

what the fuck? o_O

i'd not use it in any important circuits though. hmmm. i always threw away the stuff that seemed burned, but i think i'll just have to try this as well. maybe also compare something... fry an LED with soldering iron heat, and also fry and LED with 9 volts from a block battery, and see if it recovers. my guess is it'd recover better from heat, but... who knows? maybe it recovers from high voltage death, too.

[sciencoking]

hmmm... i wouldn´t do that on purpose although there are some recovering parts.

Most of them won´t survive that. maybe i just had luck and the LEDs and the poti weren´t fried completely and the testing just wasn´t correct (no contact, led put in backwards, etc...)

i just couldn´t do that on purpose... lol becuase i love leds and i´d feel just much too sorry for them ....

[bionerd23]

lol, actually... i do often think like that as well. i often have to reassure myself that they're just 'things' and i'm not hurting e.g. a cat or anything.

i do understand what you mean, though - totally. =)

[atomic7732]

I think like that too.

[AScannerClearly]

Damn those Alpha particles really blast those pixels like crazy!! O_O Whew!! And very nice job removing that glass; my hands are way not steady enough to do that nice of a job. ^_^ Way awesome though! Closest thing to actually seeing the radiation that we can get, without a cloud chamber at least.

I'm gonna have to go look for old webcams or digital cameras from flea markets or something so I can mutilate it properly like yours.

[bionerd23]

oh, cloud chamber... good idea! let's hope the roads clear up from the ice soon so i can get my cloud chamber up and running to provide a full blown view of THE GLORIOUS ATOM. =)

wow, lol, that'd look insane in a cloud chamber, actually. imagine all those white pixel flashes as two inches long streaks in a cloud chamber... woah.

[sciencoking]

i think that will be just one fat cloud in front of the americium :P