Prof. Nayana Majumdar

Research

Cosmic-ray Muon Tomography : Cosmic-ray muons can be used for non-destructive evaluation of any large structure studying the absorption and scattering of muons while passing through the target. An R&D work is in progress to build a muon hodoscope/telescope using position sensitive gaseous ionization detectors to discriminate different materials. The prototype setup is planned to be upgraded for evaluation of civil structures as a societal application. The R&D activities include design, fabrication and characterization of several gaseous detectors (GEM, Thick GEM, Micromegas, RPC) along with indigenously made ones, FPGA-based data acquisition system, image processing algorithm and application of machine learning in the improvement of analysis. Nuclear Reactions of Astrophysical Importance : Nuclear reactions involved in stellar evolution occur at energies much lower than the Coulomb barrier. This makes the measurement of reaction cross-sections extremely challenging in the laboratory. An R&D work is under way to design and develop an active-target Time Projection Chamber (TPC) as a new detection technology for extending the measurements of proton and alpha induced nuclear reactions to lower energies.