Word: nitric
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Dates: during 1970-1979
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Glashow synthesized nitrogen tetra-iodide, an extremely unstable compound which explodes when anything is dropped on it, and took to soaking dollar bills in nitric acid. This turns the dollar bill into flashpaper, which burns very rapidly and leaves no ash. Glashow gave this up when it became too expensive...
...field. But near the poles, where the lines of the field bend toward the earth, the protons slam into molecules in the upper atmosphere and cause a shower of electrons. These, in turn, crash into nitrogen molecules, ionizing them and allowing them to combine with oxygen. As a result, nitric oxide (NO) and nitrogen dioxide (NO 2 ) are formed; both react readily with ozone molecules and cause their destruction...
These grim warnings closely follow reports by other scientists on the potentially disastrous effects of nitric oxides, which also strip ozone of its third atom and reduce it to ordinary oxygen. Large amounts of nitric oxides are given off by the exhausts of supersonic aircraft, and a recent M.I.T. study (TIME, Sept. 9) indicates that a fleet of 500 SSTs flying regularly in or near the ozone layer would deplete it by 12% within 25 years. In the past few months, scientists have been emphasizing the even greater menace of nuclear explosions, which generate huge amounts of nitric oxides...
...Equally pressing is the problem of permanent storage for lethal radioactive wastes contained in spent reactor fuel elements. The practice now is to dissolve the fuel rods in nitric acid, then store the liquid in vats underground. Already the AEC has more than 80 million gallons of this lethal liquid (which includes wastes from weapons production) In tanks that must be constantly cooled and scrupulously maintained for hundreds of years before the radioactivity is spent. The AEC is now perfecting ways to solidify the wastes to permit storage in underground caverns. Even so, the growth of nuclear power could make...