The “Nano” kit for the general public is about to launch.  The bGeigie, an abbreviation for  Bento Geiger Counter, was named in Japan.   The original was about the size of a Bento Lunch Box.  The first box had an Inspector Alert by IMI-International Medcom in it, and it was strapped to the side of a car and driven into Fukushima Prefecture after the meltdowns at Fukushima Daiichi.  The data collected by that and subsequent expeditions were shared with the world on maps developed by nonprofit Safecast.  Safecast developed some open source electronics,added an Arduino board to collect data, a GPS receiver, a data logger with micro SD card, a Medcom iRover board for high voltage and signal processing, and they miniaturized it.

I have designed and built my own instruments for many years, and contributed to the design of 2 geiger counter kits that were pretty cool.  I have to say that Safecast has done a brilliant job on this instrument.  In my opinion it’s not only the coolest Geiger Counter kit ever, but perhaps one of the coolest DIY kits ever. What it will do:

• Display radiation data on an OLED display in uSv/hr or CPM
• Display and log time and position from onboard GPS receiver
• Combine radiation data with time/date/gps to create a detailed log
• Interface to an iPhone app developed by Safecast to share data

You can also share collected data on Safecast Maps using a user friendly API.  That data can then be viewed by you, your community and the world.   This makes you an official “Safecaster” and you will be part of a global movement to create and share “open” data.  Since the whole project is open source, you can also contribute your own ideas or modify the code to get it to do things in different ways.

When you buy this kit, a portion of the proceeds will go to nonprofit Safecast to help them build their global sensor network.  It is being offered at an amazing low introductory price.  Support materials will be available on a website.  Phone support cannot be offered at the low introductory price of $450, so the kit builder is responsible for troubleshooting the device if there are any assembly problems.

If you are an experienced kit builder you should have no problems.  If you are new to electronics you will need to learn to solder and read basic instructions.  You may want a teacher or mentor to help you.  As part of classroom  activities with appropriate learning materials (not provided with kit) you can learn a lot about basic science, physics, electronics, software, statistics, and computer science.

The kit features a highly sensitive 2 inch Pancake Geiger Mueller detector, which will detect alpha, beta and gamma and x-radiation.

Purchaser must be at least 18 years of age.  Caution is advised in assembly and handling as there is a 500 volt high voltage assembly within the instrument.

To preorder the bGeigie Nano Kit, fill out this form or contact IMI – International Medcom.

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What is a bGeigie Nano you might ask?   It is a Geiger Counter and more.   It is the smaller and younger sibling, so to speak, of the original bGeigie developed by Safecast to respond to the Fukushima Daiichi meltdowns, and the lack of radiation data during the event.  The original bGeigie was about the size of a Japanese bento box, and and was given the name as an abbreviation of “Bento Sized Geiger Counter” by Safecast Japan Director Pieter Franken.   Pieter and his talented international team went on to develop the concept and technology.  It is one powerful component of a radiation mapping system that was created for the Fukushima situation, and adapted to become a global project.   The bGeigie Nano is just now becoming available to the public as a do-it-yourself kit.   It includes a GPS receiver, micro SD card, data logger, Arduino microcontroller, OLED display, and Pancake Geiger Mueller detetor with mica window.  This powerful combination of features in one water proof package will allow you to characterize your neighborhood, home and work environment, and publish it to maps that others can view.  The Nano must be removed from the waterproof case to take advantage of the Pancake detectorʻs alpha and beta radiation sensitivity.

When I first strapped the instrument to the side of my car I remembered Pieter driving North from Tokyo into Fukushima during the incident when there was no data available on the ground there.   As the maps he and other Safecast volunteers created got published, we began to get the first pictures of what happened, where the plume went.  Eventually data was released by Japan and US governments that collaborated the data Safecast collected.   Now governments, universities,  businesses, entrepreneurs are looking at Safecast as a case study on how things can be deployed rapidly when people work together using the powerful tools we have in the internet, open source hardware and software innovations, and lean start-up principals.

People who purchase, build and deploy the powerful bGeigie Nano kit will get to:

1. Be part of a large international open source project for sharing radiation and other environmental data.
2. Learn about the power and practical benefits of open source, open data, rapid deployment technologies
3. Contribute to our collective knowledge base about radiation on Planet Earth
4. Learn some physics and electronics
5. Support Safecast (a portion of kit sales proceeds will benefit the organization)
6. Help keep your community safe

Hereʻs data I collected recently in the San Francisco Bay Area:

:

It was as easy as strapping the bGeigie Nano to the side of my car, turning it on and driving.

For information on getting your own bGeigie Nano kit, contact International Medcom, http://www.medcom.com

More information coming soon!

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See LA Times Story.

The Santa Susana Field Lab site overlooks the San Fernando Valley.

Polluted Lab Site

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Tokyo based filmmaker Adrian Storey made this 3 minute documentary about Safecast for the Focus Forward Films competition.

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Reports from Japan say the situation is stable at Fukushima Daiichi reactors.  See this Guardian report.

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Many people ask me about how to share radiation data.   Things just got easier thanks to Safecast.  It’s created by their talented team of techie volunteers.

Here are instructions on how to submit radiation data using their new API:

Everything you need is at  http://api.safecast.org

Take a moment and look through the links there.

There is a web form that allows you to upload a bGeigie log file or submit a single measurement.  A bGeigie, or bento-sized geiger counter with data logger created by Safecast, allows data to be collected with gps coordinates.   These can be obtained from Safecast if you are in Japan.  They donate them to communities and individuals who will use them to add data to the Safecast maps.  A kit version of the small version of the bGeigie will be available in coming weeks from IMI-International Medcom.   For single measurement submissions you will be asked your location and what type of instrument you are using.

Sean Bonner, Safecast Global Director tells us that you can also access the API documentation to see how to interface with that directly. With the API you can submit data directly, but you can also query specific parameters (dates, locations, submitter, etc) – there’s no front end UI for this yet so it only works in code, but Safecast is working on an advanced search page that will provide a UI front end to the API.

If you want to just pull down the full dataset it’s located here:

https://api.safecast.org/system/measurements.csv

That file updates every night so it’s very current.

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Joi Ito, right, with Sean Bonner, Tokyo April 2011, Photo by Paulo Mendes

Safecast continues to make news with its rapid collection and dissemination of radiation data since the Fukushima Daiichi disaster.  Safecast Co-Founder and Advisor Joi Ito continues to make news in the realm of technology, innovation, open data, and new ways of thinking.

Those who have been lucky to work with Joi will attest to the contagious nature of his enthusiasm for technology solutions to meet human needs.  MIT Technology Review covers Joi. Safecast, and Media Lab under Joiʻs direction in this interesting article.

In addition to his position as Director of MIT Media Lab, Joi is also Chairman of Creative Commons, and sits on the Board of New York Times, MacArthur Foundation and Knight Foundation.  He is also a board member of Witness, an organization focused on human rights.

Joi was also named by Businessweek as one of the 25 Most Influential People on the Web in 2008. In 2011, Ito was chosen by Nikkei Business as one of the 100 most influential people for the future of Japan and by Foreign Poicy Magazine as one of the “Top 100 Global Thinkers”. In 2011, he received the Lifetime Achievement Award from the Oxford Internet Institute in recognition of his role as one of the world’s leading advocates of Internet freedom.

Thank you, Joi, for the great work you are doing, and for your continued support of Safecast, radiation detection and mapping,  and open transparent data!

In early meeting of what has become Safecast, Joi (r) confers with Sean Bonner (Safecast Global Operations Director), Pieter Franken (Safecast Japan Director), and Dan Sythe (r to l) on how to rapidly deploy radiation monitoring devices and publish the data. Tokyo, April, 2011. Photo by Paulo Mendes

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Safecast Geiger Counter Reference Design by Bunnie Huang - Artistic Rendering

Sean Bonnerʻs Safecast X Kickstarter Geiger Counter was recently rated one of Kickstarterʻs Best in this Wall Street Journal article.   The instrument is remarkable, and there is also an interesting history behind it, and its creator, Bunnie Huang.

Bunnie Huang is welcomed to Tokyo, April 2011. Photo by Paulo Mendes

For background, I first met Sean and Bunnie in Tokyo in April 2011.  The building we were conferencing in was swaying from aftershocks of the Tohoku earthquake.  The conversation was largely about the lack of data on radiation levels.  The situation to the North was unstable and disconcerting.

The conference was attended by movers and shakers in the global technology arena, and the traditional media world.  The vital data transfer rate Twitter vs. Traditional Media during the Haiti earthquake, presented by Adhur Chowdhury, Chief Twitter Scientist, was truly impressive.  A number of groups and individuals in Japan and beyond were harnessing the power of the world wide web to communicate radiation data, but the numbers were confusing, some of the instrumentation was unreliable,  and general evolution was needed.  The Safecast Geiger Counter Reference Design concept was created under these conditions.  The people, circumstances, technology, the scope of the larger project it is part of, are worthy of a book.  I will attempt to condense parts of the story into a series of blog posts.

Sean Bonner, Director of Safecast Global Operations, with Adbur Chowdhury, Chief Scientist at Twitter, Tokyo Rooftop, April 2011. Photo by Paulo Mendes

Geiger Counters have been part of my life since an early age, back in the 1950ʻs, when they were built with vacuum tubes – and were the size of a large lunch box.   Analog meters were standard issue for decades, sometimes supplemented with scalers using neon light bulbs.   Many of the early instruments required special, expensive, batteries.  Iʻve witnessed, and been a part of, the evolution of the Geiger Counter, Iʻve designed them, repaired them, evaluated them, and Iʻve started and worked with companies that make them from Tennessee to California, New York, Nanjin, Minsk, and places in between and beyond.

The Safecast Reference Design is something new and different in many regards.  One, it is an open source project with the potential for world wide collaboration and evolution of functions and features.  It also has enough power under the hood to handle any conceivable workload in terms of calculations and communications of data.  It is small and beautiful and easy to use.  And it is designed to share information with the world.  Iʻll write more about some of the other salient features of this instrument later.

The Safecast Geiger Counter Reference Design is basically a labor of love by  Bunnie, a very talented engineer.  Itʻs one of his contributions to help the people of Japan during a very challenging chapter in Japanʻs history.   And the instrument will have impact and influence far beyond Japanʻs borders.  The Safecast X Kickstarter version of this instrument is a very limited edition of Bunnieʻs Safecast Reference Design.   The Limited Edition will be in clear plastics with laser-etched serial numbers starting at 001.

Andrew "Bunnie" Huang PhD. Photo Source: Wikipedia

Bunnie Huang, Sean Bonner, Joi Ito, Dan Sythe, Pieter Franken (l to r) discuss radiation detection over dinner, Tokyo, April 2011. Pieter is Director of Safecast Japan. Photo by Paulo Mendes

Bunnie was introduced to me during the April 2011 NCC conference, by Joi Ito, now Director at MIT Media Lab.  Again, this was during the period when 4 unstable reactors were still spewing radioactive materials, and Tokyo had been dusted.   There was a world wide shortage of Geiger Counters and other types of radiation detectors.  Not only was demand high, due to the emergency, but there were shortages of key components affecting the industry.   Manufacturers in Japan affected by the earthquake, tsunami and meltdown, supply many components critical to the worldwide electronic industry.

High quality Geiger tubes, the heart of all high quality Geiger Counters, are manufactured under rigorous conditions in a multistage process that cannot be speeded up without degrading the quality of the detector.  So there were only a very limited number of instruments available.

I handed over every instrument I could put my hands on to Joi and his friends, because I knew they would publish the data they gathered rapidly.

Joi Ito with "Pancake" Geiger Mueller Tube, Tokyo, April 2011. Photo by Paulo Mendes

I brought some Geiger Counter components with me to Tokyo, including some “Pancake” tubes, for the people at Tokyo Hackerspace, who were working long hours to develop instruments and get them into the field.   The Geiger tube is the heart of a Geiger Counter.  While the technology behind them is old, they are still often the best detector for mixed alpha, beta, gamma, x-radiation sources.  The large mica window on a Pancake detector allows the detection of all of these types of radiation.  A lot of measurements in Fukushima were being made with energy compensated detectors.   These tubes have a thick side wall and cannot measure anything except energetic gamma rays.   There was concern about the people who were waving these over their food and thinking it was safe to eat.  The main isotopes remaining on the ground in Fukushima were Cesium 137, Cesium 134, Strontium 90, all primarily beta emitters.  And there is some concern about Plutonium, an alpha emitter.  The pancake tubes  were in incredibly high demand.   They were worth their weight in gold at this critical time in history.

Bunnie decided he wanted to make a major commitment to this fledgling data logging/sharing project, which became Safecast, by designing the reference  Geiger Counter, with one of these precious “Two Inch Pancake Tubes” at the heart of it.  If you want to dive deeper into the heart and soul of Bunnie and his creation, read his blogpost: Safecast Geiger Counter Reference Design.    Bunnieʻs project has also been widely Tweeted, and written about in Engadget, BoingBoing, Gigaom, Security Management, Live Science, The Verge.

Bunnie is an incredibly talented young man.  Joi Ito told me he considers him to be the worldʻs best industrial designer.  Itʻs been a real honor to meet and collaborate with Bunnie to bring this instrument into the world.    My next post will have some more images of Bunnieʻs creation, a little more  history, an update on the limited edition release, and information on the upcoming commercial version of the instrument.

Bunnieʻs reference Geiger Counter Comes alive in his Singapore Lab

Bunnie Huang, right, talks radiation detection with Akiba of Tokyo Hackerspace, center, and Dan Sythe, left, Tokyo April 2011. Photo by Paulo Mendes

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A CNN article reports record levels of Cesium 137 are being recorded in some fish near Fukushima.  Other fish are testing at levels within safety limits.

Another CNN story looks at impacts on the Ocean.  More studies are needed according to the author, Ken Buesseler of Woods Hole Oceanographic Institute.

Butterflies are being affected by radiation from the disaster according to this CNN report.

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IMI Founding Chairman and Physicist Joe Jaffe

Itʻs Joe Jaffeʻs 95th birthday today, and he and I reminisced about our many adventures this afternoon.  Joe is a physicist, scientist, and entrepreneur who dedicated his life to making the world safer for the next generations.   As a young physicist  at Smith Kline in Philadelphia he convinced the management team to start a biomedical division, which he headed as Director of Instrument Research and Development.  There he pioneered, developed and patented technologies that have saved many lives, including early diagnostic ultrasound imaging systems and the first commercial doppler fetal pulse detector.  This was after Dr. Alice Stewart found that en utero x-rays were contributing to excess childhood leukemia rates in Great Britain.  Ultrasound imaging pioneered by Joe has almost completely replaced the use of x-rays on pregnant women.

Prior to Smith Kline, Joe was on the team that developed the bazooka, and he went from there to telemetry projects at NACA (the predecessor of NASA).  Later when President Nixon opened the door to China, Joe led one of the first scientific and industrial delegations into Beijing.   He came out and provided many of us the first glimpses of Chinese medical devices and practices of that period.

Joe left Smith Kline to start Products and Processes, and I met him at that phase of his career.  We partnered on some doppler fetal pulse detectors and he loaned me money to start the instrument division of SE International, where we, with Steve Weiss and a talented team,  developed some interesting radiation detection instruments including an early hand held low power device called the Monitor 4.  This was during an age when geiger counters were typically large and bulky, with poor battery life.  When our team left SE and formed IMI – International Medcom, Joe became our physicist, Chairman of the Board, and a key contributor to many radiation detection instruments including the Radalert, Radalert 50, Radalert 100, Digilert (licensed to SEI), the Geiger, the Gateman (for border security), the Inspector, Inspector Alert, and advanced radiation monitoring networks for communities.  During that period IMI introduced the first real time data on the world wide web, in a GIS format for the Three Mile Island Community.  The Gateman was the first instrument deployed at borders in Russia, Kazahkstan, Belarus, to prevent smuggling of nuclear weapons and materials.  It was part of the Nunn Lugar Mutual Threat Reduction Regime.  This was  during a very dangerous period of transition in the former Soviet Union, when nuclear scientists werenʻt getting paid and the stockpiles of nuclear materials were not secure.   Joeʻs statistical calculations and mathematical formulas contributed to a successful design that could detect as little as 10 grams of moving weapons grade uranium at a border crossing.

Joe was also an architect of the licensing agreements to share technology with SE International.   One of those agreements allows SE International to produce a version of our Inspector under their brand name.   This was in support of the friendships that were in place between the companies: Joe’s commitments and priorities include honoring friendships, creating healthy communities, protecting the environment, reducing the risk of nuclear war or nuclear accidents.  Joe didn’t need to work after he retired from Smith Kline, but he told me on many occasions that he wanted to do all that he could to create a safer world for his and other’s grandchildren.

Joe and I worked closely with Dr. Karl Morgan to develop a community monitoring program around Three Mile Island, and we also deployed systems around Seabrook and Pilgrim reactors, to serve communities in those areas.  Joe had a dream of a worldwide radiation monitoring network, so that data on radiation in the environment was transparent and available to all members of the world community.   His dream is becoming a reality through the work of another project we are actively supporting:  Safecast.   After Fukushima we were able to provide instruments that contributed to the publishing of 3 million data readings in the first year since the disaster.   In the early days of the disaster instruments Joe contributed to, significantly the Inspector Alert, documented the high radiation levels on playgrounds and school yards that were still being attended.

Joe has occasionally said that he went into physics because that realm was more predictable than the human realm.   But despite the occasional problems dealing with the human world, Joe has remained a humanitarian and the world is a safer place because of him.

Thanks to Joe, millions of pregnancies have been managed without the risk of en utero x rays, and  high quality radiation detection instruments have served numerous communities from Chernobyl to FDNY post 9/11, to the community surrounding the Three Mile Island nuclear plant, and the people of Fukushima.   We’ll never know what tragedies may have been prevented by technologies and mentoring that Joe has provided over his 95 year lifespan, but I do know that the positive impact by Joe in my world and the world of communities IMI serves has been significant.  Iʻm grateful that Joe took the time to mentor and help me when I was a young man, and to dedicate his life to creating a safer world, and I wish him a very happy birthday!

Joe retired from his post as Founding Chairman of IMI – International Medcom at age 90, but continues an active interest in the affairs of the company and the world from his home in San Jose, California.  He remains our Chairman Emeritus.

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Today marks the 67th anniversary of the use of an atomic weapon on Hiroshima, Japan.  On this day in 2010 U.S. Ambassador John Roos was the first U.S. representative to attend anniversary commemoration events.  This year Clifton Truman Daniel attended ceremonies marking the anniversary.  His Grandfather, President Harry Truman, ordered the bombing.   BBC reports Mr Truman saying that while it was hard to hear the survivors’ stories, it was important for his family to understand the full consequence of decisions made by his grandfather,

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A long time member of the Health Physics Instrumentation community, Dwane Stevens, passed away on July 20, in Sacramento, while preparing for the annual Health Physics Society conference.  I first met Dwane in the late seventies when I visited Ludlum Instruments in Sweetwater Texas.  While my companies have technically been competitors with Ludlum, I always respected Ludlumʻs products and people, and I always enjoyed seeing Dwane.  He was a straight shooter who did what he said he was going to do.  You didnʻt need contracts and lawyers to do business with Dwane.   When I traveled, in November 1990, to Russia and Belarus on Chernobyl and nuclear arms control issues with Dr. Tom Cochran of NRDC,  Dwane loaned me one of Ludlumʻs expensive scintillation detectors.  It was a challenging time in those last days of the Soviet Union – with nuclear scientists not getting paid, nuclear weapons being paraded through Red Square, new Chernobyl-related contamination zones being discovered.  Dr. Cochran and I were probably the first westerners to see the SS-24 ICMBs on November 7 of that trip.  I will always appreciate having the instrument Dwane loaned me for that exciting and hair raising adventure.  Iʻll also remember his kindness and sense of humor.  My condolences to his family and friends.

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