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General Kenneth Nichols and the Manhattan Project
Nichols
The Oak Ridger has published the latest in a series of articles about General Kenneth D. Nichols, the Manhattan Project, and the 1954 Atomic Energy Act. The series has been produced by Nichols’ grandniece Barbara Rogers Scollin and Oak Ridge (Tenn.) city historian David Ray Smith. Gen. Nichols (1907–2000) was the district engineer for the Manhattan Engineer District during the Manhattan Project.
As Smith and Scollin explain, Nichols “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, including the construction of the towns of Oak Ridge, Tennessee, and Richland, Washington. The responsibility of his position was massive as he oversaw a workforce of both military and civilian personnel of approximately 125,000; his Oak Ridge office became the center of the wartime atomic energy’s activities.”
Matthew Bono, Don Bennett, Carlos Castro, Joe Satcher, John Poco, Bill Brown, Harry Martz, Nick Teslich, Robin Hibbard, Alex Hamza, Peter Amendt, Harry Robey, Jose Milovich, Russell Wallace
Fusion Science and Technology | Volume 51 | Number 4 | May 2007 | Pages 611-625
Technical Paper | doi.org/10.13182/FST07-A1453
Articles are hosted by Taylor and Francis Online.
Indirectly driven double shell implosions are being investigated as a possible noncryogenic path to ignition on the National Ignition Facility. Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory has made several technological advances that have produced double shell targets that represent a significant improvement to previously fielded targets. The inner capsule is supported inside the ablator shell by SiO2 aerogel with a nominal density of 50 mg/cm3. The aerogel is cast around the inner capsule and then machined concentric to it. The seamless sphere of aerogel containing the embedded capsule is then assembled between the two halves of the ablator shell. The concentricity between the two shells has been improved to less than 1.5 m. The ablator shell consists of two hemispherical shells that mate at a step joint that incorporates a gap with a nominal thickness of 0.1 m. Using a new flexure-based tool holder that precisely positions the diamond cutting tool on the diamond turning machine, step discontinuities on the inner surface of the ablator of less than 0.5 m have been achieved. New methods have been used to comprehensively characterize each of the targets using high-resolution x-ray imaging systems.
