WISRD Research & Engineering Journal

Figure 2 . Graphical representation of data for threshold counts showing results from Windows PC running Equip software, The best threshold voltage is determined by increasing the threshold until the count rate change is reduced, i.e., the “kink” in the curve. This kink is at around 300 mV. This procedure was followed for all four scintillators (also referred to as paddles). 4. Raspberry Pi Because the cosmic ray detectors are being deployed on the roof of the facility housing WISRD, methods for control and data acquisition had to be fully explored. A raspberry pi is a light, inexpensive and compact computer that uses a small amount of power and has the capability to communicate with other devices over the internet. A comparison study of the FermiLab software “Equip” running on a Raspberry Pi was done in conjunction with the PC version of the software, to determine the reliability of the Pi. Comparing the established threshold levels (see Fig. 2 and 3), the Pi performed as expected and confirmed that we could use the Pi for our experiments.

Figure 3 . Graphical representation of data for threshold counts showing results from Raspberry Pi running Equip software. Data was compared to that taken on the PC version of the software (see Fig. 2) and determined to be acceptably comparable. All data and power cables were tested for reliability by using threshold reproducibility (See Figs. 4 and 5 for two examples).

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