Interesting cellphone based radiation detector
Posted: Tue Nov 22, 2016 10:15 pm
I wanted to share this interesting application I tested out earlier this fall. It's an Android (and I assume iOS but I haven't looked) app that allows you to detect gamma (and probably higher energy beta) radiation using the phone's camera.
https://play.google.com/store/apps/deta ... vity&hl=en
I was surprised to find out from several videos (and later my own tests) that this wasn't one of the many fake "geiger counter" apps you find online. It works because gamma radiation will create a white spot on the camera view when it strikes the sensor, so by completely covering the camera lens you can shield all non-ionizing radiation and measure gamma radiation.
It's obviously going to be one of the worst radiation detectors you could possibly get, but it is incredibly cheap and it does kind of work: a $10-20 Ebay or prepaid phone and a couple layers of opaque tape is all you need. I got very dramatic results with a 1 uCi Am-241 smoke alarm source (emitting ~60 keV gammas) when the lens was pressed within a centimeter of the source.
Unfortunately their site is pretty out of date on what phones they have tested, so I wasn't able to actually calibrate it properly and test vs my real geiger counter, but even without a dosage reading you can still see large increases in radiation over background pretty easily with it.
If the source is strong (like the Am-241 one pressed right up against the lens) you actually don't even need to pay for the app, since every second or so you will see a white flash on the screen (so long as your camera is properly covered).
Hope this information is useful to someone.
https://play.google.com/store/apps/deta ... vity&hl=en
I was surprised to find out from several videos (and later my own tests) that this wasn't one of the many fake "geiger counter" apps you find online. It works because gamma radiation will create a white spot on the camera view when it strikes the sensor, so by completely covering the camera lens you can shield all non-ionizing radiation and measure gamma radiation.
It's obviously going to be one of the worst radiation detectors you could possibly get, but it is incredibly cheap and it does kind of work: a $10-20 Ebay or prepaid phone and a couple layers of opaque tape is all you need. I got very dramatic results with a 1 uCi Am-241 smoke alarm source (emitting ~60 keV gammas) when the lens was pressed within a centimeter of the source.
Unfortunately their site is pretty out of date on what phones they have tested, so I wasn't able to actually calibrate it properly and test vs my real geiger counter, but even without a dosage reading you can still see large increases in radiation over background pretty easily with it.
If the source is strong (like the Am-241 one pressed right up against the lens) you actually don't even need to pay for the app, since every second or so you will see a white flash on the screen (so long as your camera is properly covered).
Hope this information is useful to someone.