Takahiro ANDO

Description of work

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Body tissues and cells radiate extremely faint light that is invisible to the human eye. This is the biophoton. So this my work, using photomultiplier tubes(*1) that are also equipped in Super-Kamiokande, detects biophotons that plant seeds emit in the course of germination. Next, these uncounted numbers of sensed photons (particles of light) are visualized and projected on a domed screen via projectors in real time.

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*1 photomultiplier tubes

The photomultiplier tube is an ultra-sensitive detector that enables to detect every single photon, the elementary particle of light. Since light appears as photons in the ultra-weak optical range, it becomes possible to count the number.

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The mechanism of the device is as follows:
Taking advantage of photoelectric effect that, if a photon strikes against a photoelectric surface, the metal entry window of the device, a photoelectron is emitted from it, a photomultiplier tube multiplies this released photoelectron and output those multiplied as pulses from the anode. Then, these output pulses are counted.