The flux of cosmic-ray induced muons is about 100 muons per square meter per sec
ID: 3280118 • Letter: T
Question
The flux of cosmic-ray induced muons is about 100 muons per square meter per second at sea level on the Earth's surface. Estimate (to within a factor of 10) how many muons pass through your body each second, and also the probability that a muon is passing through your body at this instant. (N.B. Since only an order-of-magnitude estimate is needed, you can make approximations that simplify the calculation. Learning how to do so is part of the point of this problem. Some relevant information is in the class (Yaffe) notes.)Explanation / Answer
Muons reach the Earth's surface from all directions and their flux is described as a number per unit time per unit area per unit solid angle.
Let F be the flux of muons on Earth's surface, thus,
F = 100 Muons/m2/s
If an average person occupy an area A on the Earth's surface, then muons penetrating the person each second is givena by F*A
The average surface area of a person is around 1.8 m2
Thus, number of Muons penetarting through human body in one second is given as:
100 * 1.8 = 180 Muons/sec