Since reaching a peak in the late 1980s, the world's nuclear arsenal has decreased by roughly 80 percent, but there still seems to be a lot of nuclear posturing going on. Because plutonium packs a larger punch than uranium, Iran will be required to dismantle its principle plutonium-...
Nuclear terrorism stands as the major nuclear threat in the world today. It is quite a far cry from the Cold War between the United States and the Soviet Union where nuclear missiles were the sole domain of major, nuclear powers. The theory of mutually assured destruction held those two powe...
Nuclear energy was first used in the Second World War, primarily to make nuclear bombs. But after the war, attention turned to peaceful purposes, notably for power generation. Today, the world produces as much electricity from nuclear energy, in fission reactors, as it did from all sources co...
Tactical nuclear weapons, by design, do not have as much radioactive fallout, since they are used against a specific target, but there is still some fallout. Nuclear historian Alex Wellerstein has built a simulation calledNukeMapto estimate the effects of nuclear strikes. According to NukeMap, ...
The appearance of Soviet nuclear weapons suddenly transformed the situation, and strategists found themselves confronted with little choice but to make more bombs or follow the pipe dream ofremoving all nuclear bombs. The only possible option was chosen, and both sides in the Cold War built more...
Why France Is Still a Formidable Nuclear Power In a thermonuclear weapon, the fission process is only the beginning. Modern nuclear weapons, such as the United States’ B83 bombs, use a similar fission process to what is used in atomic bombs. But that initial energy then ignites a fusion...
What is the big deal if a nuclear reactor melts down? What happens? Why does nuclear fuel explode? Why is a conventional fission nuclear reactor not able to explode as a bomb? What are some of the reasons that plutonium rather than uranium is used in all fission bombs and ...
A nuclear weapon is a type of weaponry that is responsible for generating a destructive force through nuclear reactions, fission or fusion to produce a nuclear explosion. The power of a nuclear device can be devastating to destroy a city ...
There are different types and sizes of nuclear weapons, but modern bombs start by triggering a fission reaction.Fissionis the splitting of the nuclei of heavyatomsinto lighter atoms — a process that releases neutrons. These neutrons, in turn, can careen into the nuclei of nearby atoms, splitti...
Since the Hiroshima and Nagasaki incidents, neither an atomic nor a hydrogen bomb has been used in an attack. However, the nuclear disarmament movement is still active because a variety of nations still possess, and have threatened to use, nuclear capabilities. ...