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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.
P. Mohanakrishnan, H. C. Huria
Nuclear Science and Engineering | Volume 68 | Number 2 | November 1978 | Pages 220-226
Technical Note | doi.org/10.13182/NSE78-A27294
Articles are hosted by Taylor and Francis Online.
A theoretical analysis of the reactivities of experimentally measured uniform light-water-moderated and -reflected PuO2 in UO2 lattices and Pu(NO3)4 solutions is presented here. The mixed-oxide single-rod lattices are homogenized by the use of multigroup integral transport theory, and diffusion theory is used for the cylindrical core calculations. The cross sections are derived from the WIMS library. The homogeneous spherical Pu(NO3)4 solutions are analyzed by discrete-ordinates transport theory. Due to the small size of these assemblies, it is necessary that one-dimensional core calculations also be performed with a cross-section energy-group structure that can accurately represent neutron slowing down and thermalization at the core-reflector interface. Due to the uncertainty present in the Battelle Northwest Laboratories analyses of the mixed-oxide lattices, the agreement of our predictions for these lattices with measurement is considered to be more satisfactory. Our reactivity predictions agree generally within +0.6% of measurements for the mixed-oxide lattices and within 1% for the solution systems.