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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.
S. T. Perkins
Nuclear Science and Engineering | Volume 69 | Number 2 | February 1979 | Pages 147-155
Technical Paper | doi.org/10.13182/NSE79-A20606
Articles are hosted by Taylor and Francis Online.
The neutron and fusion rate enhancement from in-flight reactions created by knock-ons from fission fragment slowing down in a compressed eqi-molar DT-plutonium plasma has been calculated. The neutron enhancement is worth up to a factor-of-2 reduction in critical mass. However, the neutron e-folding time is on the order of the system disassembly time, thereby restricting the multiplication of the neutron population to a factor of 2 or 3. It therefore appears more appropriate to discuss fission in a thermonuclear plasma in terms of a fusion chain reaction (fission fragment amplification of the fusion rate) rather than a fission chain reaction (neutron enhancement and criticality).