Word: fissionable
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...Fission to Fusion. At the end of World War II, only two ingredients were in the nuclear picture. They were uranium 235 and plutonium, both of which are fissionable, i.e., the addition of a single neutron to the atomic nucleus splits the nucleus, with a vast release of energy. Later a third nuclear ingredient, fissionable U-233, was made out of nonfissionable thorium...
About five years ago came the "fusion" reaction. In this, an isotope of hydrogen (either deuterium, H2, or tritium, H3) was forced by extreme high temperature to "fuse" into helium with an enormous release of energy. The scientists got the required high temperature by exploding a conventional fission bomb as a detonator. With this development of fusion-which has never been officially described-the number of reactive nuclear ingredients rose to at least...
...that April day in 1954 when the first public image of the hydrogen fireball billowed out of the photographs into the minds of men. Now, his shock behind him, his desperation gone, Churchill gave splendid utterance to the belief that has guided the U.S. ever since Hiroshima: that nuclear fission spells hope, as well as horror, for mankind...
...scientist expected to be able to arrange thermonuclear reactions similar to those they studied in the stars; the required heat seemed unattainable. In 1938 Otto Hahn and Lise Meitner discovered nuclear fission, and their discovery led directly to the Abomb. And fission, with its intense release of energy, also suggested that conditions could be created under which thermonuclear reactions might occur. The late Enrico Fermi in 1942 suggested to Teller that fission could be used to start thermonuclear reaction in deuterium (heavy hydrogen). "After a few weeks of hard thought," Teller recalls, "I decided that deuterium could not be ignited...
AMERICAN SCIENCE AND INVENTION, by Mitchell Wilson (437 pp.; Simon & Schuster; $10), tells in 1,200 pictures and clear, knowledgeable text the mighty success story of U.S. gadgeteers, scientists and inventors, from Ben Franklin and his kite to the nuclear fission boys...