cloud chamber, device used to detect elementary particles elementary particles, the most basic physical constituents of the universe.

Basic Constituents of Matter

Molecules are built up from the atom , which is the basic unit of any chemical element .
..... Click the link for more information. and other ionizing radiation. A cloud chamber consists essentially of a closed container filled with a supersaturated vapor, e.g., water in air. When ionizing radiation passes through the vapor, it leaves a trail of charged particles (ions) that serve as condensation centers for the vapor, which condenses around them. The path of the radiation is thus indicated by tracks of tiny liquid droplets in the supersaturated vapor. The cloud chamber was invented c.1900 by C. T. R. Wilson. In the type devised by him, which is often called the Wilson cloud chamber, air or another gas is saturated with water vapor and enclosed in a cylinder fitted with a transparent window at the top and a piston or other pressure-regulating device at the bottom. When the pressure in the chamber is suddenly reduced, e.g., by lowering the piston, the gas-vapor mixture is cooled, producing supersaturation. Cloud chambers of this design are sometimes called the pulsed type, since they do not maintain a continuous state of supersaturation of the vapor. A more recent design is the diffusion cloud chamber. In this device a large temperature difference is maintained between the top and bottom of the chamber, usually by cooling the bottom of the chamber with dry ice. The gas in the chamber, usually air, is saturated with a vapor, usually alcohol; the air-vapor mixture cools as it diffuses toward the cool bottom, becoming supersaturated. If the gas is kept saturated with a fresh supply of vapor, e.g., by an alcohol-soaked pad inside the top of the chamber, the operation of the chamber can be essentially continuous. One disadvantage of the cloud chamber is the relatively low density of the gas, which limits the number of interactions between ionizing radiation and molecules of the gas. For this reason physicists have developed other particle detectors particle detector, in physics, device for detecting, measuring, and analyzing particles and other forms of radiation entering it. Such devices play an important role not only in basic research, as in the study of elementary particles , but also in numerous
..... Click the link for more information. , notably the bubble chamber bubble chamber, device for detecting charged particles and other radiation by means of tracks of bubbles left in a chamber filled with liquid hydrogen or other liquefied gas. It was invented in 1952 by Donald Glaser.
..... Click the link for more information. and the spark chamber spark chamber, in physics, device for recording the passage of elementary particles produced by reactions in a particle accelerator . Particles pass through a stack of metal plates or wire grids that are maintained with high voltage between alternate layers.
..... Click the link for more information. .

cloud chamber

Radiation detector developed by C.T.R. Wilson. Its detecting medium is a supersaturated vapour (see saturation) that condenses around ions produced by the passage of energetic charged particles, such as alpha particles, beta particles, or protons. In a Wilson cloud chamber, supersaturation is caused by the cooling induced by a sudden expansion of the saturated vapour by the motion of a piston or an elastic membrane. In a diffusion chamber, the saturated vapour is cooled to supersaturation as it diffuses into a region kept cold by a coolant such as solid carbon dioxide or liquid helium.

cloud chamber

Physics an apparatus for detecting high-energy particles by observing their tracks through a chamber containing a supersaturated vapour. Each particle ionizes molecules along its path and small droplets condense on them to produce a visible track

cloud chamber [′klau̇d ‚chām·bər]

(nucleonics)

A particle detector in which the path of a charged particle is made visible by the formation of liquid droplets along the trail of ions left by the particle as it passes through the gas of the chamber. Also known as expansion chamber; fog chamber.