Search results
Results From The WOW.Com Content Network
The fissile isotope uranium-235 fuels most nuclear reactors.When 235 U absorbs a thermal neutron, one of two processes can occur.About 85.5% of the time, it will fission; about 14.5% of the time, it will not fission, instead emitting gamma radiation and yielding 236 U. [1] [2] Thus, the yield of 236 U per 235 U+n reaction is about 14.5%, and the yield of fission products is about 85.5%.
uranium-236: 23.42 739 10 15 seconds (petaseconds) isotope half-life 10 6 years 10 15 seconds niobium-92: 34.7 1.10 plutonium-244: 80 2.5 samarium-146: 103 3.3 ...
Natural uranium is made weapons-grade through isotopic enrichment. Initially only about 0.7% of it is fissile U-235, with the rest being almost entirely uranium-238 (U-238). They are separated by their differing masses. Highly enriched uranium is considered weapons-grade when it has been enriched to about 90% U-235. [citation needed]
Uranium-235 (235 U or U-235) is an isotope of uranium making up about 0.72% of natural uranium. Unlike the predominant isotope uranium-238, it is fissile, i.e., it can sustain a nuclear chain reaction. It is the only fissile isotope that exists in nature as a primordial nuclide. Uranium-235 has a half-life of 703.8 million years.
Uranium-236 occurs in spent nuclear fuel when neutron capture on 235 U does not induce fission, or as a decay product of plutonium-240. Uranium-236 is not fertile, as three more neutron captures are required to produce fissile 239 Pu, and is not itself fissile; as such, it is considered long-lived radioactive waste. [115]
236 Np ƒ: 233 U ƒ: 234 U № 150–250 ka: 99 Tc ₡ 126 Sn 248 Cm 242 Pu 327–375 ka: 79 Se ₡ 1.33 Ma: 135 Cs ₡ 237 Np ƒ: 1.61–6.5 Ma: 93 Zr 107 Pd 236 U 247 Cm ƒ: 15–24 Ma: 129 I ₡ 244 Pu 80 Ma ... nor beyond 15.7 Ma [16] 232 Th № 238 U № 235 U ƒ№ 0.7–14.1 Ga
A cascade of gas centrifuges at a U.S. enrichment plant in Piketon, Ohio, in 1984. Iran is using similar technology to enrich uranium. U.S. Department of EnergyIran’s nuclear program was a major ...
Depleted uranium has an even higher concentration of 238 U, and even low-enriched uranium (LEU) is still mostly 238 U. Reprocessed uranium is also mainly 238 U, with about as much uranium-235 as natural uranium, a comparable proportion of uranium-236, and much smaller amounts of other isotopes of uranium such as uranium-234, uranium-233, and ...