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Going Nuclear: Notes from the officially unofficial book tour
I work in the analytical labs at one of Europe’s oldest and largest nuclear sites: Sellafield, in northwestern England. I spend my days at the fume hood front, pipette in one hand and radiation probe in the other (and dosimeter pinned to my chest, of course). Outside the lab, I have a second job: I moonlight as a writer and public speaker. My new popular science book—Going Nuclear: How the Atom Will Save the World—came out last summer, and it feels like my life has been running at full power ever since.
M. M. R. Williams
Nuclear Science and Engineering | Volume 96 | Number 3 | July 1987 | Pages 234-240
Technical Note | doi.org/10.13182/NSE87-A16384
Articles are hosted by Taylor and Francis Online.
The one-speed transport equation is solved for a ring reactor. A complete solution is obtained for the space-time relaxation of a pulse of neutrons in a multiplying medium in which delayed neutrons are neglected. The solution consists of a fundamental mode, a finite number of harmonics, and an integral transient. A condition is deduced, which gives the maximum number of harmonics that can exist for a given ring circumference. The limitations of diffusion theory are pointed out with particular reference to the shortcomings of that theory in dealing with the early stages of evolution of the pulse. Delayed neutrons are included and a complete solution is obtained by means of the prompt jump approximation. The results are illustrated by numerical calculations designed to show the onset of instabilities in the harmonics when the reactor is sufficiently large.