So I just got back from the local ANS chapter meeting.
A friend in the same field came and picked me up, and we drove the ~30 minutes to get there. The food was fantastic, especially for the student rate which was only $15 (its like $50 for someone employed in the field). Lots of pasta :D
There was a speaker from the MIT research reactor telling us about it, which I found quite interesting. (I also felt nerdy cause I understood everything he said D:)
Though I'm gonna have to ask my nuke prof a couple questions on Wednesday, cause the MIT guy said that their reactor used heavy water as a reflector.. and I've been under the impression that the maximum scattering angle of hydrogen is 90 degrees (180 would be a backscatter... reflectors are supposed to reflect neutrons back into the core)
Oh and heavy water is water except the hydrogen atoms have a neutron (its called Deuterium oxide)
Was that post too nerdy? D:
7 comments:
Dude, that water is sooooo heavy man.
Lol, heavy water. That's interesting. I'm pretty sure I've learned that at some point.
LOL sorry AJ :P
um what?
jeremy
is heavy water natual or do we make it
hope school is well take care and be safe
bob
-__-
and @ bob- we have to enrich the water ourselves (water in nature contains about 156 parts per million D2O)
This reminds me of one of my high school science professors. He toured a nuclear power plant, and was walking along the edge of the coolant reservoir. Thousands of gallons per minute flowed through it, and he couldn't help but wonder what would happen if he dropped a penny in.
He didn't, but he made us all curious too. ;-)
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