Portal:Nuclear technology

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The Nuclear Technology Portal

Introduction

This symbol of radioactivity is internationally recognized.

• Nuclear technology is technology that involves the nuclear reactions of atomic nuclei. Among the notable nuclear technologies are nuclear reactors, nuclear medicine and nuclear weapons. It is also used, among other things, in smoke detectors and gun sights. (Full article...)
  
• Nuclear power is the use of nuclear reactions to produce electricity. Nuclear power can be obtained from nuclear fission, nuclear decay and nuclear fusion reactions. Presently, the vast majority of electricity from nuclear power is produced by nuclear fission of uranium and plutonium in nuclear power plants. Nuclear decay processes are used in niche applications such as radioisotope thermoelectric generators in some space probes such as Voyager 2. Reactors producing controlled fusion power have been operated since 1958 but have yet to generate net power and are not expected to be commercially available in the near future. (Full article...)
  
• A nuclear weapon is an explosive device that derives its destructive force from nuclear reactions, either nuclear fission (fission or atomic bomb) or a combination of fission and nuclear fusion reactions (thermonuclear weapon), producing a nuclear explosion. Both bomb types release large quantities of energy from relatively small amounts of matter. (Full article...)

General images -

The following are images from various nuclear technology-related articles on Wikipedia.

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  A schematic nuclear fission chain reaction. 1. A uranium-235 atom absorbs a neutron and fissions into two new atoms (fission fragments), releasing three new neutrons and some binding energy. 2. One of those neutrons is absorbed by an atom of uranium-238 and does not continue the reaction. Another neutron is simply lost and does not collide with anything, also not continuing the reaction. However, the one neutron does collide with an atom of uranium-235, which then fissions and releases two neutrons and some binding energy. 3. Both of those neutrons collide with uranium-235 atoms, each of which fissions and releases between one and three neutrons, which can then continue the reaction. (from Nuclear fission)
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  A Minuteman III ICBM test launch from Vandenberg Air Force Base, United States. MIRVed land-based ICBMs are considered destabilizing because they tend to put a premium on striking first. (from Nuclear weapon)
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  Soviet OTR-21 Tochka missile. Capable of firing a 100-kiloton nuclear warhead a distance of 185 km (from Nuclear weapon)
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  Three of the reactors at Fukushima I overheated, causing the coolant water to dissociate and led to the hydrogen explosions. This along with fuel meltdowns released large amounts of radioactive material into the air. (from Nuclear reactor)
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  The Leibstadt Nuclear Power Plant in Switzerland (from Nuclear power)
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  The "curve of binding energy": A graph of binding energy per nucleon of common isotopes. (from Nuclear fission)
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  The Superphénix, closed in 1998, was one of the few FBRs. (from Nuclear reactor)
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  The now decommissioned United States' Peacekeeper missile was an ICBM developed to replace the Minuteman missile in the late 1980s. Each missile, like the heavier lift Russian SS-18 Satan, could contain up to ten nuclear warheads (shown in red), each of which could be aimed at a different target. A factor in the development of MIRVs was to make complete missile defense difficult for an enemy country. (from Nuclear weapon)
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  Life-cycle greenhouse gas emissions of electricity supply technologies, median values calculated by IPCC (from Nuclear power)
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  Induced fission reaction. A neutron is absorbed by a uranium-235 nucleus, turning it briefly into an excited uranium-236 nucleus, with the excitation energy provided by the kinetic energy of the neutron plus the forces that bind the neutron. The uranium-236, in turn, splits into fast-moving lighter elements (fission products) and releases several free neutrons, one or more "prompt gamma rays" (not shown) and a (proportionally) large amount of kinetic energy. (from Nuclear fission)
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  Ukrainian workers use equipment provided by the US Defense Threat Reduction Agency to dismantle a Soviet-era missile silo. After the end of the Cold War, Ukraine and the other non-Russian, post-Soviet republics relinquished Soviet nuclear stockpiles to Russia. (from Nuclear weapon)
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  Proportions of the isotopes uranium-238 (blue) and uranium-235 (red) found in natural uranium and in enriched uranium for different applications. Light water reactors use 3–5% enriched uranium, while CANDU reactors work with natural uranium. (from Nuclear power)
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  The cooling towers of the Philippsburg Nuclear Power Plant in Germany (from Nuclear fission)
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  Activity of spent UOx fuel in comparison to the activity of natural uranium ore over time (from Nuclear power)
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  Scaled-down model of TOPAZ nuclear reactor (from Nuclear reactor)
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  Primary coolant system showing reactor pressure vessel (red), steam generators (purple), pressurizer (blue), and pumps (green) in the three coolant loop Hualong One pressurized water reactor design (from Nuclear reactor)
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  Death rates per unit of electricity production for different energy sources (from Nuclear power)
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  Dry cask storage vessels storing spent nuclear fuel assemblies (from Nuclear power)
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  Some of the Chicago Pile Team, including Enrico Fermi and Leó Szilárd (from Nuclear reactor)
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  A visual representation of an induced nuclear fission event where a slow-moving neutron is absorbed by the nucleus of a uranium-235 atom, which fissions into two fast-moving lighter elements (fission products) and additional neutrons. Most of the energy released is in the form of the kinetic velocities of the fission products and the neutrons. (from Nuclear fission)
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  The number of nuclear warheads by country in 2024, based on an estimation by the Federation of American Scientists. (from Nuclear weapon)
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  A photograph of Sumiteru Taniguchi's back injuries taken in January 1946 by a US Marine photographer (from Nuclear weapon)
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  Share of electricity production from nuclear, 2024 (from Nuclear power)
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  The Torness nuclear power station – an AGR (from Nuclear reactor)
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  Anti-nuclear weapons protest march in Oxford, 1980 (from Nuclear weapon)
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  Growth of worldwide nuclear power generation (from Nuclear power)
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  The Calder Hall nuclear power station in the United Kingdom, the world's first commercial nuclear power station (from Nuclear power)
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  Otto Hahn and Lise Meitner in 1912 (from Nuclear fission)
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  Mushroom cloud from the explosion of Castle Bravo, the largest nuclear weapon detonated by the US, in 1954 (from Nuclear weapon)
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  The stages of binary fission in a liquid drop model. Energy input deforms the nucleus into a fat "cigar" shape, then a "peanut" shape, followed by binary fission as the two lobes exceed the short-range nuclear force attraction distance, and are then pushed apart and away by their electrical charge. In the liquid drop model, the two fission fragments are predicted to be the same size. The nuclear shell model allows for them to differ in size, as usually experimentally observed. (from Nuclear fission)
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  The Trinity test of the Manhattan Project was the first detonation of a nuclear weapon, which led J. Robert Oppenheimer to recall verses from the Hindu scripture Bhagavad Gita: "If the radiance of a thousand suns were to burst at once into the sky, that would be like the splendor of the mighty one "... "I am become Death, the destroyer of worlds". (from Nuclear weapon)
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  This view of downtown Las Vegas shows a mushroom cloud in the background. Scenes such as this were typical during the 1950s. From 1951 to 1962 the government conducted 100 atmospheric tests at the nearby Nevada Test Site. (from Nuclear weapon)
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  Over 2,000 nuclear explosions have been conducted in over a dozen different sites around the world. Red Russia/Soviet Union, blue France, light blue United States, violet Britain, yellow China, orange India, brown Pakistan, green North Korea and light green (territories exposed to nuclear bombs). The black dot indicates the location of the Vela incident. (from Nuclear weapon)
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  Following the 2011 Fukushima Daiichi nuclear disaster, the world's worst nuclear accident since 1986, 50,000 households were displaced after radiation leaked into the air, soil and sea. Radiation checks led to bans of some shipments of vegetables and fish. (from Nuclear power)
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  Protest in Bonn against the nuclear arms race between the US/NATO and the Warsaw Pact, 1981 (from Nuclear weapon)
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  Diablo Canyon – a PWR (from Nuclear reactor)
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  The CANDU Qinshan Nuclear Power Plant (from Nuclear reactor)
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  The USSR and United States nuclear weapon stockpiles throughout the Cold War until 2015, with a precipitous drop in total numbers following the end of the Cold War in 1991. (from Nuclear weapon)
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  Edward Teller, often referred to as the "father of the hydrogen bomb" (from Nuclear weapon)
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  An example of an induced nuclear fission event. A neutron is absorbed by the nucleus of a uranium-235 atom, which in turn splits into fast-moving lighter elements (fission products) and free neutrons. Though both reactors and nuclear weapons rely on nuclear chain reactions, the rate of reactions in a reactor is much slower than in a bomb. (from Nuclear reactor)
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  Treatment of the interior part of a VVER-1000 reactor frame at Atommash (from Nuclear reactor)
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  The nuclear fuel cycle begins when uranium is mined, enriched, and manufactured into nuclear fuel (1), which is delivered to a nuclear power plant. After use, the spent fuel is delivered to a reprocessing plant (2) or to a final repository (3). In nuclear reprocessing, 95% of spent fuel can potentially be recycled to be returned to use in a power plant (4). (from Nuclear power)
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  The Ikata Nuclear Power Plant, a pressurized water reactor that cools by using a secondary coolant heat exchanger with a large body of water, an alternative cooling approach to large cooling towers (from Nuclear power)
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  Nuclear waste flasks generated by the United States during the Cold War are stored underground at the Waste Isolation Pilot Plant (WIPP) in New Mexico. The facility is seen as a potential demonstration for storing spent fuel from civilian reactors. (from Nuclear power)
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  The Magnox Sizewell A nuclear power station (from Nuclear reactor)
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  Drawing of the first artificial reactor, Chicago Pile-1 (from Nuclear fission)
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  Demonstration against nuclear testing in Lyon, France, in the 1980s (from Nuclear weapon)
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  The Ignalina Nuclear Power Plant – a RBMK type (closed 2009) (from Nuclear reactor)
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  The launching ceremony of USS Nautilus January 1954. In 1958 it would become the first vessel to reach the North Pole. (from Nuclear power)
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  The town of Pripyat abandoned since 1986, with the Chernobyl plant and the Chernobyl New Safe Confinement arch in the distance (from Nuclear power)
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  Olkiluoto 3 under construction in 2009. It was the first EPR, a modernized PWR design, to start construction. (from Nuclear power)
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  The basics of the Teller–Ulam design for a hydrogen bomb: a fission bomb uses radiation to compress and heat a separate section of fusion fuel. (from Nuclear weapon)
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  The mushroom cloud of the atomic bomb dropped on Nagasaki, Japan, on 9 August 1945 rose over 12 kilometres (7.5 mi) above the bomb's hypocenter. An estimated 39,000 people were killed by the atomic bomb, of whom 23,145–28,113 were Japanese factory workers, 2,000 were Korean slave laborers, and 150 were Japanese combatants. (from Nuclear fission)
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  The first nuclear weapons were gravity bombs, such as this "Fat Man" weapon dropped on Nagasaki, Japan. They were large and could only be delivered by heavy bomber aircraft (from Nuclear weapon)
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  Lise Meitner and Otto Hahn in their laboratory (from Nuclear reactor)
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  The nuclear fission display at the Deutsches Museum in Munich. The table and instruments are originals, but would not have been together in the same room. (from Nuclear fission)
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  Typical composition of uranium dioxide fuel before and after approximately three years in the once-through nuclear fuel cycle of a LWR (from Nuclear power)
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  Reactor decay heat as a fraction of full power after the reactor shutdown, using two different correlations. To remove the decay heat, reactors need cooling after the shutdown of the fission reactions. A loss of the ability to remove decay heat caused the Fukushima accident. (from Nuclear power)
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  UN vote on adoption of the Treaty on the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons on July 7, 2017
  

    Yes

    No

    Did not vote

  (from Nuclear weapon)
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  Animation of a Coulomb explosion in the case of a cluster of positively charged nuclei, akin to a cluster of fission fragments. Hue level of color is proportional to (larger) nuclei charge. Electrons (smaller) on this time-scale are seen only stroboscopically and the hue level is their kinetic energy. (from Nuclear fission)
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  Nuclear fuel assemblies being inspected before entering a pressurized water reactor in the United States (from Nuclear power)
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  The two basic fission weapon designs (from Nuclear weapon)
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  Schematic of the ITER tokamak under construction in France (from Nuclear power)
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  Fission product yields by mass for thermal neutron fission of uranium-235, plutonium-239, a combination of the two typical of current nuclear power reactors, and uranium-233, used in the thorium cycle (from Nuclear fission)
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  The Chicago Pile, the first artificial nuclear reactor, built in secrecy at the University of Chicago in 1942 during World War II as part of the US's Manhattan Project (from Nuclear reactor)
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  NC State's PULSTAR Reactor is a 1 MW pool-type research reactor with 4% enriched, pin-type fuel consisting of UO₂ pellets in zircaloy cladding. (from Nuclear reactor)
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  Montage of an inert test of a United States Trident SLBM (submarine launched ballistic missile), from submerged to the terminal, or re-entry phase, of the multiple independently targetable reentry vehicles (from Nuclear weapon)
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  The multi-mission radioisotope thermoelectric generator (MMRTG), used in several space missions such as the Curiosity Mars rover (from Nuclear power)
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  A comparison of prices over time for energy from nuclear fission and from other sources. Over the presented time, thousands of wind turbines and similar were built on assembly lines in mass production resulting in an economy of scale. While nuclear remains bespoke, many first of their kind facilities added in the timeframe indicated and none are in serial production.Our World in Data notes that this cost is the global average, while the 2 projects that drove nuclear pricing upwards were in the US. The organization recognises that the median cost of the most exported and produced nuclear energy facility in the 2010s the South Korean APR1400, remained "constant", including in export.
  LCOE is a measure of the average net present cost of electricity generation for a generating plant over its lifetime. As a metric, it remains controversial as the lifespan of units are not independent but manufacturer projections, not a demonstrated longevity. (from Nuclear power)
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  Anti-nuclear protest near nuclear waste disposal centre at Gorleben in northern Germany (from Nuclear power)
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  Most waste packaging, small-scale experimental fuel recycling chemistry and radiopharmaceutical refinement is conducted within remote-handled hot cells. (from Nuclear power)
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  Ballistic missile submarines have been of great strategic importance for the United States, Russia, and other nuclear powers since they entered service in the Cold War, as they can hide from reconnaissance satellites and fire their nuclear weapons with virtual impunity. (from Nuclear weapon)
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  In thermal nuclear reactors (LWRs in specific), the coolant acts as a moderator that must slow the neutrons before they can be efficiently absorbed by the fuel. (from Nuclear reactor)
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  The status of nuclear power globally (click for legend) (from Nuclear power)
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  The first light bulbs ever lit by electricity generated by nuclear power at EBR-1 at Argonne National Laboratory-West, December 20, 1951. (from Nuclear power)
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  A demilitarized, commercial launch of the Russian Strategic Rocket Forces R-36 ICBM; also known by the NATO reporting name: SS-18 Satan. Upon its first fielding in the late 1960s, the SS-18 remains the single highest throw weight missile delivery system ever built. (from Nuclear weapon)

Selected article -

United States of America v. Progressive, Inc., Erwin Knoll, Samuel Day, Jr., and Howard Morland, 467 F. Supp. 990 (W.D. Wis. 1979), was a lawsuit brought against The Progressive magazine by the United States Department of Energy (DOE) in 1979. A temporary injunction was granted against The Progressive to prevent the publication of an article written by activist Howard Morland that purported to reveal the "secret" of the hydrogen bomb. Though the information had been compiled from publicly available sources, the DOE claimed that it fell under the "born secret" clause of the Atomic Energy Act of 1954.

Although the case was filed in the Western District of Wisconsin, the judge there recused himself as a friend of the magazine. The case was therefore brought before Judge Robert W. Warren, a judge in the Eastern District of Wisconsin. Because of the sensitive nature of information at stake in the trial, two separate hearings were conducted, one in public, and the other in camera. The defendants, Morland and the editors of The Progressive, would not accept security clearances, as they would have had to sign non-disclosure agreements that would have put restraints on their free speech (including, significantly, in written form), and so were not present at the in camera hearings. Their lawyers did obtain clearances so that they could participate, but were forbidden from conveying anything they heard there to their clients.

The article was eventually published after the government lawyers dropped their case during the appeals process, calling it moot after other information was independently published. Despite its indecisive conclusion, law students still study the case, which "could have been a law school hypothetical designed to test the limits of the presumption of unconstitutionality attached to prior restraints". (Full article...)

More selected articles

Selected picture -

Credit: US Army Corps of Engineers

"100-B REACTOR AND WATER TREATMENT AREA." B Reactor is at center.

Did you know?

• ... that Project Carryall proposed the detonation of 23 nuclear devices in California to build a road?
• ... that the area of Cultybraggan Camp has been a royal hunting ground, a prison for fervent Nazis and the site of an underground bunker intended for use in a nuclear war?
• ... that an official investigation found the Fukushima nuclear accident was foreseeable and preventable?
• ... that music manager Alan Wills learned about management from his father, who was "in charge of the UK's nuclear early warning system"?
• ... that a nuclear reactor was nearly built at the New York Hall of Science, but the money for the institution instead went to Yankee Stadium?
• ... that the medieval Castle Knob was the site of a Cold War nuclear monitoring station?

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Selected biography -

Stafford Leak Warren (July 19, 1896 - July 26, 1981) was an American physician and radiologist who was a pioneer in the field of nuclear medicine and best known for his invention of the mammogram. Warren developed the technique of producing stereoscopic images of the breast with X-rays while working in the Department of Radiology at the University of Rochester School of Medicine.

Warren was commissioned as a colonel in the United States Army Medical Corps in 1943 and appointed Chief of the Medical Section of the Manhattan Engineering District. He was responsible for the health and safety of the thousands of personnel involved in the Manhattan Project. He was present at the Trinity nuclear test in Alamogordo, New Mexico, where he was responsible for the safety aspects of the detonation of the world's first nuclear weapon. He led a survey team from the Manhattan Project to assess the effects of the atomic bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki. In 1946 he was Chief of the Radiological Safety Section of the Joint Task Force for Operation Crossroads, the nuclear test at Bikini Atoll.

In 1947 Warren became the first dean of the School of Medicine at the University of California, Los Angeles (UCLA). Under his leadership, the new school grew from nothing to a major medical school. Although controversial and opposed by James Bryant Conant, Warren would speak out about the dangers of nuclear fallout from weapons testing from about 1947 onwards and upon the Castle Bravo test in 1954 his views were lent some credence, which informed opinion leading up to the Partial Nuclear Test Ban Treaty. Warren became Vice Chancellor, Health Services in 1962 at UCLA. From 1963 to 1965 he served as special assistant to President John F. Kennedy and later Lyndon B. Johnson on mental retardation. Returning to UCLA in 1965, he became professor emeritus, a position he held until his death in 1981. In 1971, he was awarded the Enrico Fermi Award for his contributions to science and medicine. (Full article...)

More selected biographies

Nuclear technology news

1 August 2025 – Russian invasion of Ukraine

U.S. president Donald Trump orders the deployment of two United States Navy nuclear submarines near Russia for potential military action against Russian forces in response to statements made by former Russian president Dmitry Medvedev and current deputy chairman of the Security Council of the Russian Federation regarding Trump's previously-stated deadline for ending the war in Ukraine. (Reuters) (BBC News)

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