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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.
W. Breitung, K. O. Reil
Nuclear Science and Engineering | Volume 105 | Number 3 | July 1990 | Pages 205-217
Technical Paper | doi.org/10.13182/NSE90-A19186
Articles are hosted by Taylor and Francis Online.
A sample of (U,Pu)-mixed oxide was fission heated along the saturation line and into the compressed liquid regime. The density of the sample at temperatures around 7000 K was determined from the onset of the liquid-phase pressure signal. Values for the compressibility of the (U,Pu)-mixed oxide were determined from the slope of the measured pressure/time signal. Based on these results and earlier measurements, new relations are proposed for the following properties: the density/enthalpy, density/temperature, thermal expansion/temperature, and isothermal compressibility/temperature relations. The ranges of validity are 1400 to 3600 kJ/kg and 3120 to 7600 K, respectively. The property relations are recommended for both liquid UO2 and (U,Pu)O2 with yPu ≤ 0.25. The measured data strongly suggest that the critical temperature of (U,Pu)O2 is well above 8000 K.