Nuclear detectionExperimental box to track nuclear activity by rogue nations
Researchers are carrying out a research project at Dominion Power’s North Anna Nuclear Generating Station in Virginia that could lead to a new turning point in how the United Nations tracks rogue nations that seek nuclear power. The years-long project centers on a high-tech box full of luminescent plastic cubes stacked atop one another that can be placed just outside a nuclear reactor operated by, say, Iran. The box would detect subatomic particles known as neutrinos produced by the reactor, which can be used to track the amount of plutonium produced in the reactor core.
Researchers at the Virginia Tech College of Scienceare carrying out a research project at Dominion Power’s North Anna Nuclear Generating Station in Virginia that could lead to a new turning point in how the United Nations tracks rogue nations that seek nuclear power.
The years-long project centers on a high-tech box full of luminescent plastic cubes stacked atop one another that can be placed just outside a nuclear reactor operated by, say, Iran. The box would detect subatomic particles known as neutrinos produced by the reactor, which can be used to track the amount of plutonium produced in the reactor core.
It is plutonium — the key ingredient in nuclear weapons — that U.N. regulators seek to track in all nations that are party to the Nuclear Non-proliferation Treaty, but particularly in nations seen as volatile. The Virginia Tech team calls the box “tamper proof” and says if successful, can all but eliminate instances of falsified paperwork or uneasy inspection visits.
“If they want a nuclear reactor, we can let them build it and detect its activity with a minimal impact on its operations,” said Jonathan Link, a professor in the Department of Physics, part of the College of Science. Link views nuclear energy as an important part of a new worldwide low-carbon future that nevertheless requires careful oversight from all participating nations to ensure its safety.
Link believes rogue nations that balk at having to submit to inspections would have no reason to refuse such a small, unobtrusive device. The cube is an early prototype — roughly a two-foot cube, with an active volume weighing 175 pounds — but Link and his team say with enough data collected during several months of testing at North Anna, it could soon justify to larger detectors operated by the International Atomic Energy Agency at facilities around the world.
