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The first nuclear explosive devices provided the basic building blocks of future weapons. Pictured is the Gadget device being prepared for the Trinity nuclear test.. Nuclear weapons design are physical, chemical, and engineering arrangements that cause the physics package [1] of a nuclear weapon to detonate.
Some sources claim that the neutron flux attack was also the main design goal of the various nuclear-tipped anti-aircraft weapons like the AIM-26 Falcon and CIM-10 Bomarc. One F-102 pilot noted: GAR-11/AIM-26 was primarily a weapon-killer. The bomber(s, if any) was collateral damage.
A thermonuclear weapon, fusion weapon or hydrogen bomb (H bomb) is a second-generation nuclear weapon design. Its greater sophistication affords it vastly greater destructive power than first-generation nuclear bombs , a more compact size, a lower mass, or a combination of these benefits.
A particle-beam weapon uses a high-energy beam of atomic or subatomic particles to damage the target by disrupting its atomic and/or molecular structure. A particle-beam weapon is a type of space-based directed-energy weapon , which directs focused energy toward a target using atomic scale particles.
The longer a nuclear fuel element remains in a nuclear reactor, the greater the relative percentage of 240 Pu in the fuel becomes. The isotope 240 Pu has about the same thermal neutron capture cross section as 239 Pu ( 289.5 ± 1.4 vs. 269.3 ± 2.9 barns ), [ 6 ] [ 7 ] but only a tiny thermal neutron fission cross section (0.064 barns).
In a nuclear weapon, a tamper is an optional layer of dense material surrounding the fissile material.It is used in nuclear weapon design to reduce the critical mass and to delay the expansion of the reacting material through its inertia, which delays the thermal expansion of the fissioning fuel mass, keeping it supercritical longer.
The idea of boosting was originally developed between late 1947 and late 1949 at Los Alamos. [3] The primary benefit of boosting is further miniaturization of nuclear weapons as it reduces the minimum inertial confinement time required for a supercritical nuclear explosion by providing a sudden influx of fast neutrons before the critical mass would blow itself apart.
A modulated neutron initiator is a neutron source capable of producing a burst of neutrons on activation. It is a crucial part of some nuclear weapons, as its role is to "kick-start" the chain reaction at the optimal moment when the configuration is prompt critical. It is also known as an internal neutron initiator.