A group of UC Berkeley students working with researchers at the Department of Energy’s Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory (Berkeley Lab) have developed devices that will measure and report levels of background radiation. Called DoseNet, the open-source project aims to get school and university clubs to create Raspberry Pi-powered devices that will take readings from a radiation-watch.org board (the white board with the copper foil around it) and then report back the data to a central repository. The whole device is kept inside a 3D-printed case. Currently, the project stretches from California to Japan! You can read much more about the project here and visit the DoseNet website here.
Yes…. at £58.80 + delivery, you might get the odd reading from Surrey or Islington. $58 is approximately the conversion price from Japanese Yen, and of course _they_ don’t have a rip-off 20% tax to pay! Pounds for dollars is the going rate in rip-off Britain. 🙁
A shame there isn’t an open hardware version, though I suppose the sensor is the limiting factor.