Nuclear Technology

A smoke detector is a device that detects smoke, typically as an indicator of fire. In this device, one of the civilian applications of nuclear chemistry is seen.
An ice breaker is a special purpose ship or boat designed to move and navigate through ice covered waters. Several technological advances were introduced into icebreaking technology over the years, but it was not until the introduction of nuclear power in the Soviet icebreaker Lenin in 1959 that icebreakers developed to their full potential.

Technetium-99m is a meta-stable nuclear isomer of technetium-99, symbolised as 99 m Tc. It is used in tens of millions of medical diagnostic procedures annually, making it the most commonly used medical radioisotope.

Radura is an international symbol indicating that a food product has been irradiated. This symbol is usually green and resembles a plant in circle. Food irradiation is a process of treating a food to a specific dosage of ionizing radiation for a predefined length of time. This process slows or halts spoilage due to the growth of pathogens. Further applications include sprout inhibition, delay of ripening, increase of juice yield and improvement of rehydration.

In 1896, Henri Becquerel was investigating phosphorescence in uranium salts when he discovered a new phenomenon, which came to be called radioactivity. He along with Pierre and Marie Curie began investigating the phenomenon. In the process, they isolated the element radium, which is highly radioactive.

The process of nuclear fusion may release or absorb energy. When the resulting nucleus is lighter than iron, energy is normally released. When the nucleus is heavier than that of iron, energy is generally absorbed.

Nuclear fission is the process of splitting a nucleus into roughly equal parts, and releasing energy and neutrons in the process. If these neutrons are captured by another unstable nucleus, they can do fission as well leading to a chain reaction. The average number of neutrons released per nucleus that go on to fission another nucleus is referred to as k.
Values of k larger than 1 mean that the fission reaction is releasing more neutrons than it absorbs.
Therefore, it is referred to as a self-sustaining chain reaction.

Cold fusion is a hypothetical type of nuclear reaction that would occur at or near room temperature compared with temperatures (in the millions of degrees), which is required for hot fusion. Cold fusion gained attention after reports in 1989 by Stanley Pons and Martin Fleischmann, then one of the world's leading electrochemists.

Magnetic confinement uses magnetic and electric fields to heat and squeeze the hydrogen plasma. Microwaves, electricity and neutral particle beams from accelerators heat a stream of hydrogen gas. This heating turns the gas into plasma. This plasma gets squeezed by super-conducting magnets, thereby allowing fusion to occur. The most efficient shape for the magnetically confined plasma is a donut shape (toroid). A reactor of this shape is called a tokamak. ITER project in France is using this method.

Raja Ramanna was an Indian nuclear scientist and a prominent physicist. He is best known for his leadership directing the research integral for the development of Indian nuclear programme in its early stages. Having started and joined the nuclear programme in 1964, Ramanna worked under Homi Jehangir Bhabha, and later, after the disastrous death of Homi Bhaba, he was immediately elevated to become the directing officer of this programme.

Pokharan I was the first confirmed nuclear test by a nation outside the five permanent members of the United Nations Security Council. Since the NPT entered into force in 1970, three states that were not parties to the Treaty have conducted nuclear tests, namely India, Pakistan and North Korea. Israel is also widely believed to have nuclear weapons though it has refused to confirm or deny this.

CIRUS stands for Canada-India Reactor, U. S. CIRUS was supplied by Canada in 1954, but uses heavy water (deuterium) supplied by the United States. It is the second oldest reactor in India. Even if the reactor has a life of twenty more years, India had declared that this reactor would be shut down by 2010 in accordance with the Indo-US nuclear accord reached between Indian Prime Minister Manmohan Singh and US President George W. Bush. The reactor was shut down on 31^st December, 2010.

Pokhran-II refers to peaceful test explosions of five nuclear devices, three on 11^th May and two on 13^th May 1998, conducted by India at the Pokhran test range. These nuclear tests resulted in a variety of sanctions against India by a number of major states.
On 18^th May 1974, India exploded its first nuclear device in an operation code named Smiling Buddha (Pokhran-I). After about a quarter century, on 11^thMay 1998, Operation Shakti (Pokhran-II) was carried out. Shakti was the code name for the nuclear devices that were detonated.

Dhruva reactor is India's largest nuclear research reactor, which is located in the Mumbai (Bombay) suburb of Trombay at the Bhabha Atomic Research Centre (BARC). It is India's primary generator of weapons-grade plutonium-bearing spent fuel for its nuclear weapons program. Originally named the R-5, this pool-type reactor first went critical on 8 August 1985 after 10 years of construction.

Raja Ramanna Centre for Advanced Technology is a unit of Department of Atomic Energy, Government of India. This centre is engaged in R&D in non-nuclear front-line research areas of lasers, particle accelerators and related technologies.

Institute for Plasma Research (IPR) is an autonomous physics research institute located in India. The institute is involved in research in aspects of plasma science including basic plasma physics, research on magnetically confined hot plasmas and plasma technologies for industrial applications. It is a large and leading plasma physics organisation in India. The institute is mainly funded by Department of Atomic Energy. IPR is playing major scientific and technical role in Indian partnership in the international fusion energy initiative ITER.

ADITYA is a medium size tokamak installed at the Institute for Plasma Research in India. Steady state operation of tokamaks plays an important role in high temperature magnetically confined plasma research.

Fast Breeder Test Reactor (FBTR) is located at Kalpakkam, India. The Indira Gandhi Center for Atomic Research (IGCAR) and Bhabha Atomic Research Center (BARC) jointly designed, constructed, and operate the reactor.

Nuclear binding energy is the energy required to split a nucleus of an atom into its component parts. The component parts are neutrons and protons, which are collectively called nucleons. The binding energy of nuclei is always a positive number because all nuclei require net energy to separate them into individual protons and neutrons.

Jaduguda mine located in Jaduguda village in the Purbi Singhbhum district of the Indian state of Jharkhand, commenced operation in 1967 and was the first uranium mine in India.
Tummalapalle mine is a uranium mine in Tumalapalli village located in Kadapa of the Indian state of Andhra Pradesh. As of March 2012, India possesses only two functional uranium mines, including the Jaduguda Mine. Uranium purification plant came into existence here in 2011.

Arihant class vessels are India's first indigenously designed and built nuclear submarine. They were developed under the US$2.9 billion Advanced Technology Vessel (ATV) project to design and build nuclear-powered submarines. The lead vessel of the class, INS Arihant, is set to be launched for trial by the Indian Navy. Four vessels of the class are under development and expected to be in commission by 2015.

K family of missiles is a series of submarine-launched ballistic missiles (SLBM) developed by India to boost its second-strike capabilities and thus the nuclear deterrence. Information about this family of missiles has mostly been kept classified.

The classified 'K' missile family is known as the 'Black Project', which DRDO officials are covertly working on. It is reported that the top secret indigenous K missiles are faster, lighter and stealthier. These 'K' missiles are intrinsically important for India's nuclear deterrent arsenal because they provide India with a much needed ideal and invulnerable second-strike capability stated in India's Nuclear Doctrine. Thus, it shifts the balance of power in India's favour in Asian region.

No first use (NFU) refers to a pledge or a policy by which a nuclear power will not use nuclear weapons as a means of warfare unless there is first nuclear attack by an adversary.The concept can also be applied to chemical or biological warfare.
NATO has repeatedly rejected calls for adopting NFU policy, arguing that pre-emptive nuclear strike is a key option.
In addition to India and China, North Korea is the third (East) Asian nation to have made a public pledge not to use nuclear weapons first.

Betavoltaics are generators of electrical current that use energy from a radioactive source emitting beta particles (electrons). A common source used is the hydrogen isotope; tritium. Unlike most nuclear power sources <span style="font-family:" arial;="" font-size:="" small;="">(thermoelectric and thermionic sources)<span style="font-family:" arial;="" font-size:="" small;="">, which use nuclear radiation to generate heat, are then used to generate electricity. Betavoltaics use a non-thermal conversion process; converting the electron-hole pairs produced by the ionization trail of beta particles traversing a semiconductor.

Plutonium is a radioactive actinide metal whose isotope, plutonium-239, is one of the three primary fissile isotopes. To be considered fissile, an isotope's atomic nucleus must be able to break apart or fission when struck by a slow moving neutron and to release enough additional neutrons to sustain the nuclear chain reaction by splitting further nuclei. Fission of a kilogram of plutonium-239 can produce an explosion equivalent to 21, 000 tons of TNT. It is this energy that makes plutonium-239 useful in nuclear weapons and reactors.

The sievert (Sv) is the International System of Units (SI) of equivalent radiation dose, effective dose and committed dose. Quantities that are measured in sieverts are designed to represent the stochastic biological effects of ionising radiation. This SI unit is named after Rolf Maximilian Sievert.

The only countries known to have detonated nuclear weapons and that acknowledge possessing such weapons are (chronologically by date of first test) the United States, the Soviet Union (succeeded as a nuclear power by Russia), the United Kingdom, France, the People's Republic of China, India, Pakistan, and North Korea. In addition, Israel is also widely believed to possess nuclear weapons though it does not acknowledge having them.

Commonly used moderators include regular (light) water (roughly 75% of the world's reactors), solid graphite (20% of reactors) and heavy water (5% of reactors). Beryllium has also been used in some experimental types, and hydrocarbons have been suggested as another possibility.

In nuclear engineering, a neutron moderator is a medium that reduces the speed of fast neutrons, thereby turning them into thermal neutrons capable of sustaining a nuclear chain reaction involving uranium-235.

IAEA (International Atomic Energy Agency) serves as an intergovernmental forum for scientific and technical cooperation in the peaceful use of nuclear technology and nuclear power worldwide. The IAEA was established as an autonomous organization on 29 July 1957. Though established independently of the United Nations, through its own international treaty - the IAEA Statute - the IAEA reports to both the UN General Assembly and Security Council. IAEA and its former Director General, Mohamed ElBaradei, were jointly awarded the Nobel Peace Prize that was on October 7, 2005.