(* Content-type: application/mathematica *) (*** Wolfram Notebook File ***) (* http://www.wolfram.com/nb *) (* CreatedBy='Mathematica 6.0' *) (*CacheID: 234*) (* Internal cache information: NotebookFileLineBreakTest NotebookFileLineBreakTest NotebookDataPosition[ 145, 7] NotebookDataLength[ 173692, 4816] NotebookOptionsPosition[ 169728, 4691] NotebookOutlinePosition[ 170135, 4708] CellTagsIndexPosition[ 170092, 4705] WindowFrame->Normal*) (* Beginning of Notebook Content *) Notebook[{ Cell[CellGroupData[{ Cell[TextData[{ StyleBox["Calculation of the critical radius of a fissionable device\n", FontFamily->"Times New Roman"], StyleBox[" Comments on a note in the", "Subsubtitle", FontFamily->"Times New Roman"], StyleBox[" \"Los Alamos Primer\" ", "Subsubtitle", FontFamily->"Times New Roman", FontSlant->"Italic"], StyleBox["(by Robert Serber and Richard Rhodes) and an article on neutron \ multiplication by Rudolf Peierls. \n ", "Subsubtitle", FontFamily->"Times New Roman"], StyleBox[" ", "Subsubtitle", FontFamily->"Times New Roman", FontWeight->"Plain", FontVariations->{"CompatibilityType"->0}], StyleBox["A Mathematica document by S\[ODoubleDot]ren Molander\n Change \ notes:\n 2005-09-09: Fixed a typo in Eq 1''. Minor changes in text and \ elaborated an integral.\n 2005-09-10: Fixed a minus sign in the Eigenvalue \ calculation of Peierls formula. The plot of the Lf/f Eigen function is now \ correct. Also compared Peierls approximation with a more accurate one and \ made color coded plots. \n 2005-09-11: Checked the solution of Peierls \ forumla for \[Beta]\[Rule]\[Alpha] which checks much better with the ", "Subsubtitle", FontFamily->"Times New Roman", FontSize->12, FontWeight->"Plain", FontVariations->{"CompatibilityType"->0}], StyleBox["Primer", "Subsubtitle", FontFamily->"Times New Roman", FontSize->12, FontWeight->"Plain", FontSlant->"Italic", FontVariations->{"CompatibilityType"->0}], StyleBox[" version. Rewrote some parts of the text\n 2005-09-14: Made \ numerical values modular for swift evaluation of the document for either U235 \ or PU239. \n 2005-09-17: Changed notation from total transport cross section \ to the more correct transport cross section. \n 2005-10-09: Fixed a factor \ of 1/2 missing in eq. 1''. \n", "Subsubtitle", FontFamily->"Times New Roman", FontSize->12, FontWeight->"Plain", FontVariations->{"CompatibilityType"->0}] }], "Title"], Cell[CellGroupData[{ Cell["Introduction", "Section"], Cell[TextData[{ StyleBox["One can say that modern nuclear physics started with Werner \ Heisenberg who applied quantum mechanics to the atomic nucleus 1932, the same \ year that James Chadwick discovered the neutron. In 1934 Enrico Fermi \ discovered unknown radioactive elements when bombarding a substance with \ neutrons and in 1938 Strassman and Hahn performed the first controlled \ fission experiment. In 1939 Lise Meitner and Otto Frisch used Niels Bohr's \ liquid drop model to conclude that Uranium was transmuted into Barium under \ the release of large amounts of energy. In 1939 an explosion of theoretical \ and experimental work was done on nuclear fission and the same year the \ notion of critical mass first saw the day, at least in published form. Leo \ Szilard and and Enrico Fermi were among the first to realize that nuclear \ fission could trigger a chain reaction, but they decided not to publish their \ findings to prevent Germany from using their results. It has been disputed if \ Werner Heisenberg tried delibrately to slow down the wartime German efforts \ towards a nuclear bomb, what is known is that the efforts were behind those \ of the allies. \n\nWhen I did nuclear physics in undergraduate school I was \ interested in the physics of neutron multiplication and how it gave rise to \ the notion of \"critical mass\". Naturally I never expected to find a \ realistic calculation using detailed models (which is rightly classified \ information), but was more interested in a \"back of the envelope\" argument \ that highlighted the basic physics. However, I had never found any \ information on the internet or in books on this subject, so I decided to \ compile this document. It is an attempt to fill in some of the details of the \ critical mass calculations based on the article by Rudolf Peierls published \ 1939 [1] and the notes in the book ", FontFamily->"Times New Roman"], StyleBox["\"The Los Alamos Primer\"", FontFamily->"Times New Roman", FontSlant->"Italic"], StyleBox["[2]. The ", FontFamily->"Times New Roman"], StyleBox["Primer", FontFamily->"Times New Roman", FontSlant->"Italic"], StyleBox[" was a set of 5 lectures given by Robert Serber in April 1943 for \ the physicists at Los Alamos on the basic physics and the related engineering \ problems of building a nuclear bomb. Much of the material had been worked out \ at a small group of people at Berkely headed by Robert Oppenheimer and \ including names like Hans Bethe, Edward Teller and Richard Tolman. The Primer \ was originally declassified in 1965 and has now been published in an extended \ book form by Robert Serber and Richard Rhodes, where additional material has \ been included. \n\n Many of the physical properties of Uranium were not well \ known at the time when the document was written down and here I have tried to \ use the modern values of cross sections and densities (I am not sure about \ the value for the absolute geometric cross sections). The effect of an \ external shell (or \"tamper\", an outer shell which mirrors neutrons makes \ the effective critical mass even smaller) has been disregarded, readers are \ referred to the ", FontFamily->"Times New Roman"], StyleBox["Primer", FontFamily->"Times New Roman", FontSlant->"Italic"], StyleBox[" and the seminal book by Richard Rhodes ", FontFamily->"Times New Roman"], StyleBox["\"The Making of the Atom Bomb\"", FontFamily->"Times New Roman", FontSlant->"Italic"], StyleBox["[3] for more details. One of the first notes on the critical mass \ and neutron multiplication was published by Francis Perrin [4]; I have not \ read this paper so I can't comment on it here.\n \nFirst let us define some \ important physical properties of fissionable materials, the most central ones \ being the \"cross section\" (see the ", FontFamily->"Times New Roman"], StyleBox["Endnotes", FontFamily->"Times New Roman", FontSlant->"Italic"], StyleBox[" in the ", FontFamily->"Times New Roman"], StyleBox["Primer", FontFamily->"Times New Roman", FontSlant->"Italic"], StyleBox["). The geometric cross section is the area taken up by a nucleus \ of radius ", FontFamily->"Times New Roman"], StyleBox["R", FontFamily->"Times New Roman", FontSlant->"Italic"], StyleBox[". Assuming ", FontFamily->"Times New Roman"], StyleBox["R = ", FontFamily->"Times New Roman", FontSlant->"Italic"], Cell[BoxData[ FormBox[ SuperscriptBox["10", RowBox[{"-", "12"}]], TraditionalForm]], FontFamily->"Times New Roman", FontSlant->"Italic"], StyleBox["cm one gets ", FontFamily->"Times New Roman"], StyleBox["\[Sigma]=\[Pi]", FontFamily->"Times New Roman", FontSlant->"Italic"], Cell[BoxData[ FormBox[ SuperscriptBox["R", "2"], TraditionalForm]], FontFamily->"Times New Roman", FontSlant->"Italic"], StyleBox["\[TildeEqual] 3 ", FontFamily->"Times New Roman"], Cell[BoxData[ FormBox[ RowBox[{ SuperscriptBox["10", RowBox[{ RowBox[{"-", "24"}], " "}]], " ", SuperscriptBox["cm", RowBox[{"-", "2"}]]}], TraditionalForm]], FontFamily->"Times New Roman"], StyleBox[". Assume a thin foil of thickness d and area A with a number \ density of ", FontFamily->"Times New Roman"], StyleBox["n ", FontFamily->"Times New Roman", FontSlant->"Italic"], StyleBox["= ", FontFamily->"Times New Roman"], Cell[BoxData[ FormBox[ FractionBox[ RowBox[{"\[Rho]", " ", FormBox[ SubscriptBox["N", "A"], TraditionalForm]}], "M"], TraditionalForm]], FontSlant->"Italic"], " (", Cell[BoxData[ FormBox[ SubscriptBox["N", "A"], TraditionalForm]], FontWeight->"Bold", FontSlant->"Italic"], " is Avogadro's number 6.022 ", Cell[BoxData[ FormBox[ SuperscriptBox[ RowBox[{"10", " "}], "23"], TraditionalForm]]], ") ", StyleBox["neutrons per unit volume and M is the mass in atomic units. For \ U235 n \[Tilde] ", FontFamily->"Times New Roman"], " 4.84 ", Cell[BoxData[ FormBox[ SuperscriptBox["10", RowBox[{"22", " "}]], TraditionalForm]]], StyleBox["(see below). To get some idea on how sparse the atoms are \ scattered in the foil, let's calculate the average distance between atoms. \ This is simply 1/", FontFamily->"Times New Roman"], Cell[BoxData[ FormBox[ RadicalBox["n", "3"], TraditionalForm]]], StyleBox[" \[Tilde] 2.7 ", FontFamily->"Times New Roman"], Cell[BoxData[ FormBox[ SuperscriptBox["10", RowBox[{"-", "8"}]], TraditionalForm]]], " or 27000 times the size of an atom and from the point of view of a small \ particle entering the foil at high speed, it sees mostly empty space. ", StyleBox["The total area filled with nuclei is thus", FontFamily->"Times New Roman"], StyleBox[" ", FontFamily->"Times New Roman", FontWeight->"Bold"], StyleBox["nAd\[Sigma] ", FontFamily->"Times New Roman", FontSlant->"Italic"], StyleBox[" and a neutron passing through the foil has a chance of hitting a \ foil nucleus with probablity ", FontFamily->"Times New Roman"], Cell[BoxData[ FormBox[ FractionBox[ RowBox[{"area", " ", "of", " ", "nuceli"}], RowBox[{"total", " ", "area"}]], TraditionalForm]], FontFamily->"Times New Roman"], StyleBox["= ", FontFamily->"Times New Roman"], StyleBox["nd\[Sigma]", FontFamily->"Times New Roman", FontSlant->"Italic"], StyleBox[". In a similar way, the probability of fission is given as a cross \ section ", FontFamily->"Times New Roman"], Cell[BoxData[ FormBox[ StyleBox[ SubscriptBox["\[Sigma]", "f"], FontFamily->"Courier"], TraditionalForm]], FontFamily->"Times New Roman"], StyleBox[" and the fraction of collisions that give rise to fission is", FontFamily->"Times New Roman"], StyleBox[" ", FontFamily->"Times New Roman", FontWeight->"Bold"], Cell[BoxData[ FormBox[ StyleBox[ FractionBox[ SubscriptBox["\[Sigma]", "f"], "\[Sigma]"], FontFamily->"Courier"], TraditionalForm]], FontFamily->"Times New Roman", FontSlant->"Italic"], StyleBox[". The number of fissions in the foil is ", FontFamily->"Times New Roman"], Cell[BoxData[ FormBox[ StyleBox[ SubscriptBox["C", "f"], FontWeight->"Bold"], TraditionalForm]], FontFamily->"Times New Roman", FontSlant->"Italic"], StyleBox["=n", FontFamily->"Times New Roman", FontSlant->"Italic"], Cell[BoxData[ FormBox["\[Sigma]", TraditionalForm]], FontFamily->"Times New Roman", FontSlant->"Italic"], StyleBox["d", FontFamily->"Times New Roman", FontSlant->"Italic"], Cell[BoxData[ FormBox[ StyleBox[ RowBox[{ SubscriptBox["\[Sigma]", "f"], "/", "\[Sigma]"}], FontWeight->"Bold"], TraditionalForm]], FontFamily->"Times New Roman", FontSlant->"Italic"], StyleBox["=n", FontFamily->"Times New Roman", FontSlant->"Italic"], Cell[BoxData[ FormBox[ SubscriptBox["\[Sigma]", "f"], TraditionalForm]], FontFamily->"Times New Roman", FontSlant->"Italic"], StyleBox["d.", FontFamily->"Times New Roman", FontSlant->"Italic"], StyleBox[" ", FontFamily->"Times New Roman", FontWeight->"Bold"], StyleBox["The time it takes a neutron to pass through the foil is ", FontFamily->"Times New Roman", FontVariations->{"CompatibilityType"->0}], StyleBox["d=v\[Tau]", FontFamily->"Times New Roman", FontSlant->"Italic", FontVariations->{"CompatibilityType"->0}], StyleBox[", where v is the velocity which for 1 Mev neutrons can be \ approximated by ", FontFamily->"Times New Roman", FontVariations->{"CompatibilityType"->0}], StyleBox["E=", FontFamily->"Times New Roman", FontSlant->"Italic", FontVariations->{"CompatibilityType"->0}], Cell[BoxData[ FormBox[ FractionBox[ SuperscriptBox["mv", "2"], "2"], TraditionalForm]], FontFamily->"Times New Roman", FontSlant->"Italic"], StyleBox["and is about 1.4 ", FontFamily->"Times New Roman", FontVariations->{"CompatibilityType"->0}], Cell[BoxData[ FormBox[ SuperscriptBox["10", "9"], TraditionalForm]], FontFamily->"Times New Roman"], StyleBox[" cm/s. This means that the rate of fissions is ", FontFamily->"Times New Roman", FontVariations->{"CompatibilityType"->0}], Cell[BoxData[ FormBox[ SubscriptBox["C", "f"], TraditionalForm]], FontFamily->"Times New Roman"], "/\[Tau]", StyleBox[" and the inverse gives the time per fission, ", FontFamily->"Times New Roman"], StyleBox["\[Tau]=", FontFamily->"Times New Roman", FontSlant->"Italic"], Cell[BoxData[ FormBox[ FractionBox["1", RowBox[{"n", " ", SubscriptBox["\[Sigma]", "f"], "v"}]], TraditionalForm]], FontFamily->"Times New Roman", FontSlant->"Italic"], StyleBox[". ", FontFamily->"Times New Roman", FontSlant->"Italic"], StyleBox["\n", FontFamily->"Times New Roman", FontVariations->{"CompatibilityType"->0}], StyleBox[" ", FontFamily->"Times New Roman"], StyleBox["\nThe cross sections here are given below for the relevant \ energies involved, around 1 Mev (the values here are given in the extended \ version of the ", FontFamily->"Times New Roman", FontVariations->{"CompatibilityType"->0}], StyleBox["Primer", FontFamily->"Times New Roman", FontSlant->"Italic", FontVariations->{"CompatibilityType"->0}], StyleBox["). Measurements made by several groups before 1939 (including \ Niels Bohr) showed that U235 had a significant fission cross section over a \ wide range of energies, which was important since only fast neutrons could \ make a significant contribution to a possible chain reaction in a bomb \ (unlike a nuclear fission reactor, where the opposite is true). Early \ experiments showed that the fission cross section of Uranium 238 drops \ sharply at energies < 1 Mev so natural Uranium has to be enriched to extract \ the isotope 235. Plutonium is a more efficient medium (higher fission cross \ section), it was discovered in 1942 by Glenn Seaborg and the isotope PU239 \ was used in the Trinity explosion 1945. \n\n", FontFamily->"Times New Roman", FontVariations->{"CompatibilityType"->0}], StyleBox["Technical notes", "Subsubsection", FontFamily->"Times New Roman", FontVariations->{"CompatibilityType"->0}], StyleBox["\nThe ", FontFamily->"Times New Roman", FontVariations->{"CompatibilityType"->0}], StyleBox["Mathematica", FontFamily->"Times New Roman", FontSlant->"Italic", FontVariations->{"CompatibilityType"->0}], StyleBox[" document can evaluated using values for U235 or for PU 239, see \ below. The first time the notebook is evaluated there will be some minor \ warning messages mostly related to the naming of variables (they will \ disappear the 2:nd time). The evaluation of the integral in eq. 12 takes a \ long time, please be patient. Many of the physical properties of PU239 are \ classified, so the numerical results for this case should be taken with a \ grain of salt, especially the total cross section. ", FontFamily->"Times New Roman", FontVariations->{"CompatibilityType"->0}], StyleBox["Mathematica", FontFamily->"Times New Roman", FontSlant->"Italic", FontVariations->{"CompatibilityType"->0}], StyleBox[" consistently outputs numerical values to 15 decimals in the \ html-document. This is an artefact and the real accuracy is in the order of \ 1-2 decimal places. 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