The publicly stated purpose of this refurbishment is to extend the vehicles’ service lives, but the effort appears to also involve adding a “burst height compensation” to enhance the targeting effectiveness of the warheads (Postol Citation2014). The first production unit was approved in March ...
Boosting refers to a process whereby fusion reactions are used to create neutrons, which are then used to induce fission reactions at a higher rate. It took another eight years before the first test confirmed the validity of boosting, but once the proof came, it became a popular design. In...
First off before we get into the good and bad of nuclear power, what exactly is it? Nuclear power is the use of nuclear reactions that release nuclear energy. These nuclear reactions involve nuclear fission, nuclear decay and nuclear fusion. The nuclear energy released is turned into heat whic...
defined as reactions involving the atomic nucleus, neutrons and protons are rearranged, and in this process atoms actually change from one element to another. Chemical reactions, by contrast, involve the electrons in the outer layers of the atom. In chemical reactions, atoms are rearranged...
There are several types of fusion reactions. Most involve the isotopes of hydrogen called deuterium and tritium: Proton-proton chain - This sequence is the predominant fusion reaction scheme used by stars such as the sun. Two pairs of protons form to make two deuterium atoms. Each deuterium ato...
This is a strong indication that hydrogen can trigger nuclear reactions that seem to involve the nuclei of the lattice (which would yield a fission-like pattern of products). Confronted with a situation where some experiments in the field yield a fusion-like pattern of products (CF experiments)...
What are the uses of radioactive isotopes in medicine? How does an atom/nucleus change during a nuclear process? How are radioisotopes produced in cyclotron? How are radioactive isotopes used in medical imaging? What is the difference between chemical and nuclear reactions?
Nuclear Reactions Nuclear reactions are reactions between nuclei which involve tremendous amounts of energy and in which mass number and charge are conserved. Alpha and beta decay, fission and fusion are all types of nuclear reactions. Unlike chemical reactions, atomic number is usually changed. ...
Such close integration of nuclear and conventional bombers into the same task force can have significant implications for crisis stability, misunderstandings, and the risk of nuclear escalation because it could result in overreactions and misperceptions about what is being signaled. Additionally, since ...
This process is called spontaneous fission because it does not involve any outside influences. In the case of uranium-238, the process has a very low probability, requiring more than 1015 years for half of the material to be transformed (its so-called half-life) by this reaction. On the ...