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Nuclear Energy Conference & Expo (NECX)
September 8–11, 2025
Atlanta, GA|Atlanta Marriott Marquis
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Latest News
The Frisch-Peierls memorandum: A seminal document of nuclear history
The Manhattan Project is usually considered to have been initiated with Albert Einstein’s letter to President Franklin Roosevelt in October 1939. However, a lesser-known document that was just as impactful on wartime nuclear history was the so-called Frisch-Peierls memorandum. Prepared by two refugee physicists at the University of Birmingham in Britain in early 1940, this manuscript was the first technical description of nuclear weapons and their military, strategic, and ethical implications to reach high-level government officials on either side of the Atlantic. The memorandum triggered the initiation of the British wartime nuclear program, which later merged with the Manhattan Engineer District.
William P. Duggan, Don Stelner , Mark J. Embrechts
Fusion Science and Technology | Volume 10 | Number 3 | November 1986 | Pages 890-895
Innovative Concepts for Power Conversion | Proceedings of the Seveth Topical Meeting on the Technology of Fusion Energy (Reno, Nevada, June 15–19, 1986) | doi.org/10.13182/FST86-A24849
Articles are hosted by Taylor and Francis Online.
A design of a compact fusion reactor is proposed based on the reversed field pinch and utilizing the "Integrated-Blanket-CoiI" (IBC) concept. The IBC is applied to the toroidal field and divertor systems, with liquid metal used for cooling both the first wall and blanket. This simplifies the overall design by requiring only a single coolant cycle. In addition, safety is increased by eliminating any possible lithium-water interaction in the fusion power core. Finally, replacing conventional copper divertor coils with IBC components enhances tritium breeding and energy recovery. A generic problem with liquid metal coolants is their reduced heat transfer capabilities in magnetic fields. In this context, the use of liquid metal coolants may limit the allowable neutron wall loading to a value of 10 MW/m2. Above this value it may be necessary to use water cooling for the first wall and divertor surfaces.
