• NUCLEAR WASTEGerman Nuclear Phaseout Leaves Radioactive Waste Problem

    By Klaus Deuse

    While Germany searches for a permanent storage facility for its nuclear waste, it risks sitting on piles of dangerous waste for decades. The problem drains public finances by hundreds of millions of euros every year.

  • NUCLEAR WEAPONSNuclear Engineer Uses Machine Learning on Weapons Testing Images to Understand Fallout

    After WWII, the U.S. wanted to better understand what happened after a nuclear weapon was detonated. Researchers conducted tests in the southwestern U.S. and the Pacific Ocean and recorded those experiments on film. Scientists used the original reel-to-reel films to manually measure data from the blasts. Today, nuclear forensic scientists combine modern computational techniques with the historical records of nuclear tests to obtain precious insights into the physics of these type of events, which are otherwise hard to study experimentally.

  • NUCLEAR MATTERSUsing Artificial Mussels to Monitor Radioactivity in the Ocean

    Amid the global concern over the pollution of radioactive wastes in the ocean, researchers have conducted a study which has found that “artificial mussels” (AMs) can effectively measure low concentrations of radionuclides in the sea. It is believed that this technology can be applied as a reliable and effective solution for monitoring radioactive contamination around the world.

  • NUCLEAR INCIDENTSTraining for Nuclear Incidents and Preparing WMD Responses

    By Justin S. Griffin

    “Radiological material can end up in almost any location or any place and take on almost any shape and form,” an expert told participants a few weeks ago at the first Sandia Lab’s Weapons of Mass Destruction Counterterrorism and Incident Response Showcase. Preparing for nuclear incidents is not dealing with hypotheticals. “It is not practice. It is not an exercise. It is real life stuff,” he said.

  • Iran’s ThreatThe Iran Threat Geiger Counter: Moving Toward Extreme Danger

    By The Institute for Science and International Security

    The Iran Threat Geiger Counter from the Institute for Science and International Security measures on a regular basis Iran’s hostile intentions toward the United States and U.S. allies, and its capability to turn these hostile intentions into action. As with the radiation levels measured by a Geiger counter, any level above zero represents a degree of danger, and over the last six months, the threat posed by Iran has increased. As of May 2023, the Institute assigns Iran a total threat score of 140 out of 180, up from 130 in October 2022, and assessed as High Danger.

  • RADIATION DETECTIONExploring Feasibility of Using Drones to Survey Sites for Low Levels of Radiation

    By Allan Brettman

    Drones are tools for search and rescue, traffic monitoring, weather monitoring, and perhaps even package hauling. One day, they may work with humans to augment the task of conducting surveys to detect low levels of radiation—information that could contribute to the decommissioning of sites no longer needed for nuclear-related energy production or research.

  • NUCLEAR RISKSNuclear Agency Cannot Continue With “Business as Usual” in the Shifting Supercomputing Landscape: Report

    The National Nuclear Security Administration (NNSA) needs to fundamentally rethink the strategy for its next generation of high-performance computing, says a new report from the National Academies of Sciences.

  • NUCLEAR NONPROLIFERATIONProducing Medical Isotopes While Lowering the Risk of Nuclear Weapons Proliferation

    Scientists and engineers at Argonne have been working for decades to help medical isotope production facilities around the world change from the use of highly enriched uranium (HEU) to the use of low-enriched uranium (LEU), which is much more difficult to use in a weapon.

  • NUCLEAR POWEREnhancing Advanced Nuclear Reactor Analysis

    By Mollie Rappe

    Nuclear power is a significant source of steady carbon-neutral electricity, and advanced reactors can add more of it to the U.S. grid, which is vital for the environment and economy. Sandia Lab researchers have developed a standardized screening method to determine the most important radioactive isotopes that could leave an advanced reactor site in the unlikely event of an accident.

  • NUCLEAR WASTEGermany: Seeking Solution for Remaining Nuclear Waste

    By Jens Thurau

    Nuclear energy in Germany has been history since mid-April. The last three nuclear power plants ended their operations on April 15. Germany’s nuclear power might be gone, but nuclear waste isn’t going anywhere. The search for a location for a final repository remains a challenge.

  • NUCLEAR WEAPONSNorth Korea’s Nuclear Tests Expose Neighbors to Radiation Risks

    Tens of thousands of North Koreans and people in South Korea, Japan, and China could be exposed to radioactive materials spread through groundwater from an underground nuclear test site. North Korea secretly conducted six tests of nuclear weapons at the Punggye-ri site in the mountainous North Hamgyong Province between 2006 and 2017.

  • IRAN’S NUKESIran Enriching Uranium to Near-Weapon-Grade 84%: IAEA

    IAEA inspectors found uranium particles enriched up to nearly 84 percent in Iran’s underground Fordow uranium enrichment site. The 83.7 percent enriched uranium is just below the 90 percent purity needed for nuclear weapons. Experts say that Iran would need no more than 10-14 days to use the material to produce an atomic bomb.

  • SURVIVING NUCLEAR ATTACKSHow to Shelter from a Nuclear Explosion

    There is no good place to be when a nuclear bomb goes off. Anything too close is instantly vaporized, and radiation can pose a serious health threat even at a distance. Researchers simulated an atomic bomb explosion from a typical intercontinental ballistic missile and the resulting blast wave to see how it would affect people sheltering indoors.

  • SURVIVING NUCLEAR ATTACKSHow to Survive a Tactical Nuclear Bomb? Defense Experts Explain

    By Robert K. Niven, Chi-King Lee, Damith Mohotti, and Paul Hazell

    What would happen during a tactical nuclear bomb explosion, including the three stages of ignition, blast, and radioactive fallout? How one might be able to survive such an explosion?

  • NUCLEAR POWERA New Way to Assess Radiation Damage in Reactors

    By David L. Chandler

    A new method could greatly reduce the time and expense needed for certain important safety checks in nuclear power reactors. The approach could save money and increase total power output in the short run, and it might increase plants’ safe operating lifetimes in the long run.