Search results
Results From The WOW.Com Content Network
In February 1940, Glenn Seaborg and Edwin McMillan produced plutonium-239 by bombarding uranium with deuterons. This produced neptunium, element 93, which underwent beta-decay to form a new element, plutonium, with 94 protons. [4] Kennedy built a series of detectors and counters to verify the presence of plutonium.
Urchin was the code name for the internal neutron initiator used by the Los Alamos Laboratory as a neutron generating device to trigger the nuclear detonation of the earliest plutonium atomic bombs such as The Gadget and Fat Man, once the critical mass had been 'assembled' by the force of conventional explosives.
Fat Man Replica of the original Fat Man bomb Type Nuclear fission gravity bomb Place of origin United States Production history Designer Los Alamos Laboratory Produced 1945–1949 No. built 120 Specifications Mass 10,300 pounds (4,670 kg) Length 128 inches (3.3 m) Diameter 60 inches (1.5 m) Filling Plutonium Filling weight 6.2 kg Blast yield 21 kt (88 TJ) "Fat Man" (also known as Mark III) was ...
The pits of the first nuclear weapons were solid, with an urchin neutron initiator in their center. The Gadget and Fat Man used pits made of 6.2 kg of solid hot pressed plutonium-gallium alloy (at 400 °C and 200 MPa in steel dies – 750 °F and 29,000 psi) half-spheres of 9.2 cm (3.6 in) diameter, with a 2.5 cm (1 in) internal cavity for the initiator.
Watchdogs are raising new concerns about legacy contamination in Los Alamos, the birthplace of the atomic bomb and home to a renewed effort to manufacture key components for nuclear weapons. A ...
It is unknown though possible to make a composite design using high grade plutonium in the bullet only. After it was discovered that the "Thin Man" program would not be successful, Los Alamos redirected its efforts into creating the implosion-type plutonium weapon: "Fat Man". The gun program switched completely over to developing a uranium bomb.
The demon core (like the core used in the bombing of Nagasaki) was, when assembled, a solid 6.2-kilogram (14 lb) sphere measuring 8.9 centimeters (3.5 in) in diameter.. It consisted of three parts made of plutonium-gallium: two hemispheres and an anti-jet ring, designed to keep neutron flux from "jetting" out of the joined surface between the hemispheres during implosi
(Reuters) - U.S. President-elect Donald Trump in an interview published on Thursday said he will be talking to Robert F. Kennedy Jr., his nominee to run the Department of Health and Human Services ...