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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.
R. T. Santoro, R. G. Alsmiller, Jr., J. M. Barnes, G. T. Chapman, J. S. Tang
Nuclear Science and Engineering | Volume 80 | Number 4 | April 1982 | Pages 586-602
Technical Paper | doi.org/10.13182/NSE82-A18972
Articles are hosted by Taylor and Francis Online.
Integral experiments that measure the streaming of ∼14-MeV neutrons through a 0.30-m-diam iron duct (length-to-diameter ratio ∼ 3) imbedded in a concrete shield have been carried out at the Oak Ridge National Laboratory. Calculated and measured neutron and gamma-ray energy spectra are compared at 16 detector locations on and off the cylindrical axis of the duct. The measured spectra were obtained using an NE-213 liquid scintillator detector with pulse-shape discrimination to simultaneously resolve neutron and gamma-ray events. The calculated spectra were obtained using a computer code network that incorporates two radiation transport methods: discrete ordinates (with P3 multigroup cross sections) and Monte Carlo (with continuous point cross sections). The two radiation transport methodologies are required to properly account for neutrons that single scatter from the duct to the detector. The calculated and measured outgoing neutron energy spectra above 850 keV agree within 5 to 50% depending on detector location and neutron energy. The calculated and measured gamma-ray spectra above 750 ke V are also in favorable agreement, ∼5 to 50%, depending on detector location and gamma-ray energy.