Portal:Nuclear technology
The Nuclear Technology Portal
Introduction
- Nuclear technology is technology that involves the nuclear reactions of atomic nuclei. Among the notable nuclear technologies are nuclear reactors, nuclear medicine and nuclear weapons. It is also used, among other things, in smoke detectors and gun sights. (Full article...)
- Nuclear power is the use of nuclear reactions to produce electricity. Nuclear power can be obtained from nuclear fission, nuclear decay and nuclear fusion reactions. Presently, the vast majority of electricity from nuclear power is produced by nuclear fission of uranium and plutonium in nuclear power plants. Nuclear decay processes are used in niche applications such as radioisotope thermoelectric generators in some space probes such as Voyager 2. Generating electricity from fusion power remains the focus of international research. (Full article...)
- A nuclear weapon is an explosive device that derives its destructive force from nuclear reactions, either fission (fission bomb) or a combination of fission and fusion reactions (thermonuclear bomb), producing a nuclear explosion. Both bomb types release large quantities of energy from relatively small amounts of matter. (Full article...)
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Smyth was commissioned to write the report by Major General Leslie R. Groves, Jr., the director of the Manhattan Project. The Smyth Report was the first official account of the development of the atomic bombs and the basic physical processes behind them. It also served as an indication as to what information was declassified; anything in the Smyth Report could be discussed openly. For this reason, the Smyth Report focused heavily on information, such as basic nuclear physics, which was either already widely known in the scientific community or easily deducible by a competent scientist, and omitted details about chemistry, metallurgy, and ordnance. This would ultimately give a false impression that the Manhattan Project was all about physics.
The Smyth Report sold almost 127,000 copies in its first eight printings, and was on The New York Times best-seller list from mid-October 1945 until late January 1946. It has been translated into over 40 languages. (Full article...)
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Did you know?
- ... that after journalist Adele Ferguson's criticism of the U.S. Navy's sex discrimination attracted nationwide attention, she was offered a personal tour of a nuclear submarine?
- ... that in 1958 the Scyla theta pinch device was the first to demonstrate controlled nuclear fusion in the laboratory?
- ... that coral cores from Flinders Reef capture environmental changes caused by the use of nuclear weapons?
- ... that Project Carryall proposed the detonation of 23 nuclear devices in California to build a road?
- ... that campaigning by climate activist Kimiko Hirata halted plans to build 17 new coal-fired power plants following the Fukushima nuclear disaster in Japan?
- ... that Helen Steven shared the Gandhi International Peace Award for her opposition to the nuclear submarine base in Scotland?
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Selected biography -
At age 23, she was the youngest and only female member of the team which built and experimented with the world's first nuclear reactor (then called a pile), Chicago Pile-1, in a project led by her mentor Enrico Fermi. In particular, Woods was instrumental in the construction and then utilization of geiger counters for analysis during experimentation. She was the only woman present when the reactor went critical. She worked with Fermi on the Manhattan Project, and she subsequently helped evaluate the cross section of xenon, which had poisoned the first Hanford production reactor when it began operation.
After the war, she became a fellow at Fermi's Institute for Nuclear Studies at the University of Chicago. She later worked at the Institute for Advanced Study in Princeton, New Jersey, the Brookhaven National Laboratory, and New York University, where she became a professor in 1962. Her research involved high-energy physics, astrophysics and cosmology. In 1966 she divorced John Marshall and married Nobel laureate Willard Libby. She moved as a professor to the University of Colorado, and was a staff member at RAND Corporation. In later life she became interested in ecological and environmental issues, and she devised a method of using the isotope ratios in tree rings to study climate change. She was a strong advocate of food irradiation as a means of killing harmful bacteria. (Full article...)
Nuclear technology news
- 7 April 2024 – Russian invasion of Ukraine
- Zaporizhzhia Nuclear Power Plant crisis
- The IAEA reports that the Zaporizhzhia Nuclear Power Plant's Unit 6 was targeted by a drone strike, although nuclear safety has not been compromised, according to the statement. (IAEA)
- 29 March 2024 – North Korea–Russia relations, North Korea and weapons of mass destruction
- Russia vetoes the continued monitoring of United Nations sanctions on the North Korean nuclear weapons program. (AP)
- 22 March 2024 – Russian invasion of Ukraine
- The Dnieper Hydroelectric Station in Zaporizhzhia is hit by a missile causing extensive damage and a large fire. A trolleybus initially reported as carrying civilians was destroyed in the attack, later confirmed to have been empty apart from the driver who was killed. Shelling also damages one of the two power lines connected to the Russian-occupied Zaporizhzhia Nuclear Power Plant. (The Guardian) (The Kyiv Independent)
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