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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. M. Berman
Nuclear Science and Engineering | Volume 16 | Number 3 | July 1963 | Pages 315-328
Technical Paper | doi.org/10.13182/NSE63-A26534
Articles are hosted by Taylor and Francis Online.
Four irradiated UO2 samples were ground to break them along grain boundaries, then dissolved in a series of successive leaches with 3N HNO3. The successive acid extractions were then analyzed for Cs138, Ce144, Zr95, Sr90, and Eu155, as well as total uranium. Very considerable variation in the specific activities of the fission fragments was found between one acid extraction and another of the same sample. The fission products were concentrated in the first and last portions of the material to dissolve. In one sample, which underwent irradiation for a very short time, the increase in concentration in the last portion to dissolve was not observed. It is speculated, on this and other evidence, that fission fragments do not remain in solid solution in uranium dioxide, but instead migrate to grain boundaries and other lattice defect sites.