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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. D. Kelley, B. L. Twitty
Nuclear Science and Engineering | Volume 13 | Number 4 | August 1962 | Pages 374-377
Technical Paper | doi.org/10.13182/NSE62-A26179
Articles are hosted by Taylor and Francis Online.
An improved neutron activation procedure for determining the U235 content in impure uranium samples is presented. With 95% confidence, a relative precision of ±1% is obtained at the level of 0.7 wt % U235. An ethyl acetate extraction is used to purify the uranium chemically. Most of the uranium decay products are removed by extraction with 2-thenoyltrifluoroacetone (TTA) in xylene. The purified uranium, which is subsequently activated as U3O8, has a consistent gamma background level. Utilization of a i.d. well scintillation crystal has permitted the use of large diameter aluminum planchettes holding 2 gm aliquots of U3O8. This system has minimized the problem of varying irradiation geometries caused by differences in U3O8 bulk density. Data from a sample recycle program are presented to illustrate the relative precision of ±1%. Comparisons between neutron activation and mass spectrometric results agree within ±1%.