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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.”
Armando B. Antoniazzi, Clive S. Morton, Kevin P. Chen, Baojun Liu
Fusion Science and Technology | Volume 54 | Number 2 | August 2008 | Pages 635-638
Technical Paper | Process Applications | doi.org/10.13182/FST08-A1895
Articles are hosted by Taylor and Francis Online.
A tritium exposure apparatus has been designed and built for the purposes of generating a high-pressure tritium atmosphere at 523 K. The loading system consists of a uranium tritide storage bed, an intermediate tritium transfer chamber filled with 5A molecular sieve, and the sample exposure chamber. The loading system resides in a sealed glovebox with a nitrogen atmosphere that is continually purged through a Glovebox Clean-up System. The tritium used in each loading experiment is approximately 6000 Ci (22 TBq). The process entails transferring the tritium inventory from the uranium storage bed to the cryogenically cooled (77 K) molecular sieve chamber. The molecular sieve at liquid nitrogen temperature is capable of adsorbing tritium to densities of 290 Ci/gram at one atmosphere. At 523 K a maximum tritium pressure of 21 MPa is achieved. The loading apparatus is used to develop high-density radioactive isotope fuel for self-powered microelectronic and micromechanical devices. This paper presents the design specifics of the tritium exposure apparatus, the steps taken in generating the high-temperature, high-pressure tritium atmosphere and the performance characteristics of the apparatus. Additionally, the handling practices and equipment utilized to conduct the tests safely are presented.