ANS is committed to advancing, fostering, and promoting the development and application of nuclear sciences and technologies to benefit society.
Explore the many uses for nuclear science and its impact on energy, the environment, healthcare, food, and more.
Explore membership for yourself or for your organization.
Conference Spotlight
2026 ANS Annual Conference
May 31–June 3, 2026
Denver, CO|Sheraton Denver
Latest Magazine Issues
Mar 2026
Jan 2026
Latest Journal Issues
Nuclear Science and Engineering
April 2026
Nuclear Technology
February 2026
Fusion Science and Technology
Latest News
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.
Mark Nelkin
Nuclear Science and Engineering | Volume 7 | Number 3 | March 1960 | Pages 210-216
Technical Paper | doi.org/10.13182/NSE60-A25704
Articles are hosted by Taylor and Francis Online.
An improved theoretical basis is presented for the interpretation of the pulsed-neutron technique for measuring thermal-neutron absorption cross sections and transport parameters. A procedure is given for the exact solution of the Fourier-transformed, multivelocity transport equation in an infinite medium. The objective is the calculation of the decay constant of the thermalized neutron flux following an initial pulse of fast neutrons. The method used is an expansion of the decay constant and neutron spectrum in a power series in the Fourier-transform variable. The procedure is first illustrated for the case of isotropic scattering and then generalized to anistropic scattering by using the spherical harmonics expansion. The results are given in terms of integral equations whose solution involves a knowledge of the energy-transfer cross sections between thermal neutrons and the moderating material. The approach employed is to extract the maximum amount of information which is independent of these cross sections and to derive explicitly the equations involving them. It is necessary to solve these equations in order to obtain more accurate information. Finally, the relation of the infinite medium Fourier transform variable to the geometric buckling of a finite sample is discussed. It is noted that the conventional interpretation of the experiments in terms of the diffusion coefficient and diffusion cooling coefficient requires the assignment of an equivalent infinite medium buckling to each finite sample measured. The discussion in the present paper makes plausible the validity of this procedure.