Path: utzoo!utgpu!jarvis.csri.toronto.edu!mailrus!cs.utexas.edu!tut.cis.ohio-state.edu!rutgers!att!cbnews!military From: mamba@csd4.csd.uwm.edu (Paul A Deisinger) Newsgroups: sci.military Subject: Re: Linear implosion in nuclear weapons? Keywords: nuclear implosion fusion fission Message-ID: <10851@cbnews.ATT.COM> Date: 1 Nov 89 04:50:51 GMT References: <10711@cbnews.ATT.COM> <10744@cbnews.ATT.COM> Sender: military@cbnews.ATT.COM Organization: University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee Lines: 40 Approved: military@att.att.com From: mamba@csd4.csd.uwm.edu (Paul A Deisinger) In article <10744@cbnews.ATT.COM> smb@ulysses.homer.nj.att.com (Steven M. Bellovin) writes: > >In article <10711@cbnews.ATT.COM>, dcn@cbnewsd.ATT.COM (david.c.newkirk) writes: >>From the picture in the book, the whole thing is shaped to fit very >well into a bomb. The presence of more tritium would presumably speed >up the fusion reaction; modern weapons do in fact use tritium. In >fact, some of them can be ``tuned''; by varying the amount of tritium >actually in the bomb, the yield can be varied in the field. > --Steve Bellovin > smb@ulysses.att.com > att!ulysses!smb That reminds me, take a look at this story off of the AP newswire: "An Energy Department laboratory in Tennesee lost a significant amount of radioactive tritium in a test shipment between two lab buildings, raising the possibility of foul play, governmental records show. Ironically, the secret test was done as a part of an internal investigation into troubling discrepancies in the amount of tritium shipped from the Oak Ridge National Laboratory at Oak Ridge, Tenn., to commercial buyers. Tritium supplies are classified by teh government. The material is produced in Energy Department reactors in South Carolina for use in nuclear warheads, although small amounts are sold to domestic and foreign companies. No explanation could be found for the tritium lost in the test shipment, according to a report Wednesday." Wonderful, just wonderful. Paul Deisinger -- My other .sig is a porche. Boongawa.