Word: plutonium
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...Atomic Energy Commission announced that plutonium, core of the atomic bomb that devastated Nagasaki, had, to a certain extent, been tamed. It would still be a long time before atomic energy would turn a wheel or drive a plane, but the new "fast reactor" (see SCIENCE) was a long step beyond the apocalyptic vision of Bikini...
Hazardous Past. The tight-lipped Atomic Energy Commission did not tell all it knows about the new "reactor." The active substance is plutonium, which wrecked Nagasaki. This time it is under exact control. In operation since last November, the tame bomb can be throttled down until "the heat produced in the core of the reactor is no greater than that given off by a kitchen oven...
Essentially, the tame bomb is a "pile" like the original uranium pile at the University of Chicago. But uranium needs slow-moving neutrons to make its atoms split. Thus, a uranium pile is made up of small rods of uranium embedded in a large mass of graphite. Plutonium is different: its atoms can be split by fast neutrons. So a pile made of plutonium needs no graphite or other "moderator." The "Nagasaki model" atom bomb is a plutonium pile that reacts so quickly that it blows itself (and the neighborhood) to bits in millionths of a second...
...they solved the problem has not been fully explained. Uranium piles are kept from reacting too fast by inserting cadmium rods into the graphite. The rods absorb neutrons and check the action. The more cadmium, the slower the pile percolates. Some similar method may be controlling the tame plutonium...
Brookhaven's pile is designed primarily for research; it will produce little or no explosive plutonium. From its graphite and uranium interior will come a more plentiful supply of the radioactive isotopes which are already transforming U.S. science. Through its thick shield will shoot the neutrons which are powerful research tools. An elaborate "hot laboratory" will study the dangerous substances and radiations coming from the pile...