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  2. Plutonium-239 - Wikipedia

    en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Plutonium-239

    Fissioning of plutonium-239 provides more than one-third of the total energy produced in a typical commercial nuclear power plant. [6] Reactor fuel would accumulate much more than 0.8% plutonium-239 during its service life if some plutonium-239 were not constantly being "burned off" by fissioning. A small percentage of plutonium-239 can be ...

  3. Weapons-grade nuclear material - Wikipedia

    en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Weapons-grade_nuclear_material

    Weapons-grade plutonium is defined as being predominantly Pu-239, typically about 93% Pu-239. [24] Pu-240 is produced when Pu-239 absorbs an additional neutron and fails to fission. Pu-240 and Pu-239 are not separated by reprocessing. Pu-240 has a high rate of spontaneous fission, which can cause a nuclear weapon to pre-detonate.

  4. MOX fuel - Wikipedia

    en.wikipedia.org/wiki/MOX_fuel

    Reprocessing the plutonium into usable fuel increases the energy derived from the original uranium by some 12%, and if the uranium-235 is also recycled by re-enrichment, this becomes about 20%. [6] Plutonium is only reprocessed and used once as MOX fuel; spent MOX fuel, with a high proportion of minor actinides and plutonium isotopes, is stored ...

  5. Reactor-grade plutonium - Wikipedia

    en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Reactor-grade_plutonium

    Reactor-grade plutonium (RGPu) [1] [2] is the isotopic grade of plutonium that is found in spent nuclear fuel after the uranium-235 primary fuel that a nuclear power reactor uses has burnt up. The uranium-238 from which most of the plutonium isotopes derive by neutron capture is found along with the U-235 in the low enriched uranium fuel of ...

  6. Breeder reactor - Wikipedia

    en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Breeder_reactor

    But since plutonium-breeding reactors produce plutonium from U238, and thorium reactors produce fissile U233 from thorium, all breeding cycles could theoretically pose proliferation risks. [61] However U-232, which is always present in U-233 produced in breeder reactors, is a strong gamma-emitter via its daughter products, and would make weapon ...

  7. Nuclear weapon design - Wikipedia

    en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nuclear_weapon_design

    The critical mass of an uncompressed sphere of bare metal is 50 kg (110 lb) for uranium-235 and 16 kg (35 lb) for delta-phase plutonium-239. In practical applications, the amount of material required for criticality is modified by shape, purity, density, and the proximity to neutron-reflecting material , all of which affect the escape or ...

  8. Read more of the story of the 'Father of Oak Ridge' as the ...

    www.aol.com/read-more-story-father-oak-125219618...

    In this capacity he had supervision of the research and development connected with, and the design, construction and operation of all plants required to produce plutonium-239 and uranium-235 ...

  9. Gun-type fission weapon - Wikipedia

    en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gun-type_fission_weapon

    It was thought that if a plutonium gun-type bomb could be created, then the uranium gun-type bomb would be very easy to make by comparison. However, it was discovered in April 1944 that reactor -bred plutonium ( Pu-239 ) is contaminated with another isotope of plutonium, Pu-240 , which increases the material's spontaneous neutron-release rate ...