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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.
K. V. Subbaiah, A. Natarajan
Nuclear Science and Engineering | Volume 96 | Number 4 | August 1987 | Pages 330-342
Technical Paper | doi.org/10.13182/NSE87-A16396
Articles are hosted by Taylor and Francis Online.
Transport calculations have been performed using the one-dimensional gamma-ray transport code ASFIT for materials of high atomic number (Z), such as tin, tungsten, lead, and uranium, for incident energies in the range of 0.030 to 0.5 MeV, where the fluorescent X rays are important. The relative impact of different components of K X rays on the spectra and buildup factors at various depths in the medium has been assessed for a typical case. Approximate analytic results are derived and compared with the computed X-ray contributions. Point isotropic air and medium response buildup factors computed for these materials have been given, filling the gap in the existing standard tables. Since the buildup factors are not amenable for conventional interpolation in this region, the values are given at close intervals of incident photon energy.