Long-term measurements using silicon radiation spectrometer Liulin on board commercial aircraft have been performed since 2001; results were put into a new database, which covers more than 4500 flights with more than 130 000 measurements. Methodology and tools were developed to normalize the data with respect to latitude and altitude and thus enable comparison with other radiation detectors and with model calculations. This capability is demonstrated using data from the neutron monitor at Lomnický štít. Instead of providing data files for individual measurement period, two software solutions are delivered. First is a web-based user interface for visualizing and downloading arbitrary time window of interest from the database hosted at http://cr10.odz.ujf.cas.cz. The second is a set of interactive Python notebooks available at GitHub. Those implement the calibration, normalization and visualization methods—so the outputs can be tailored to user needs. The software and data are provided under GNU/CC license.
Abstract. This article describes the equipment, and its advantages, used for in-situ ground measurements of thunderstorm phenomena using measuring cars. By using all-sky high-speed cameras, radio receivers, and electric field measurements, typical lightning discharges in the central Europe region have been characterized. Measurements of ionizing radiation during storms using a gamma spectrometer were also performed. At the ground level, no ionizing radiation originating in the storm cloud was detected even though during other experiments, using the same equipment at lower altitudes corresponding to the lower part of the storm clouds, ionizing radiation was detected. We showed that radio antennas with appropriately constructed receivers and all-sky high-speed cameras are devices that can significantly contribute to the understanding of processes taking place in the storm cloud during lightning discharges. On the contrary, measurements of the vertical electric field did not provide any new information about the processes occurring in the thunderclouds.
This article introduces a new open-source dosimeter AIRDOS intended for measurements on board aircraft. In-flight measurement of a mixed radiation field is a challenging deal that requires a small low-power-consumption battery-operated lightweight device with long endurance. A new innovative electronic design with a silicon PIN diode used as a sensor is presented, including full description and manufacturing documentation. The device was verified by measurements and compared with reference dosimeters widely used in aircraft dosimetry, such as Liulin MDU and HAWK TEPC. A comparison of the measurements with a computation model CARI 7 was performed as well. All the comparisons yield positive results within known errors. The new design of the dosimeter has a very satisfactory performance in terms of battery life and does not need calibration after manufacturing or recalibration after a long time of usage. Open-source design predetermines AIRDOS for future improvements and open-science.
scite is a Brooklyn-based organization that helps researchers better discover and understand research articles through Smart Citations–citations that display the context of the citation and describe whether the article provides supporting or contrasting evidence. scite is used by students and researchers from around the world and is funded in part by the National Science Foundation and the National Institute on Drug Abuse of the National Institutes of Health.