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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.”
K. Hasegawa, K. Horii, M. Matsuyama, K. Watanabe
Fusion Science and Technology | Volume 28 | Number 3 | October 1995 | Pages 1497-1502
Tritium Waste Management and Discharge Control | Proceedings of the Fifth Topical Meeting on Tritium Technology In Fission, Fusion, and Isotopic Applications Belgirate, Italy May 28-June 3, 1995 | doi.org/10.13182/FST95-A30624
Articles are hosted by Taylor and Francis Online.
The rate of the UV-stimulated HT oxidation was studied in H2(HT)-O2-O3 atmospheres with excess O3. The concentration of HTO increased linearly with UV irradiation time. The formation rate of HTO was estimated to be 3.4 × 102 Bq cm−3 s−1, which was about 14000 times greater than that of the UV-stimulated HT oxidation in the H2(HT)-O2 atmosphere. Namely the excess O3 greatly assisted the UV-stimulated HT oxidation. The HTO formation obeyed the half order kinetics to hydrogen pressure and 0.7 order with respect to photon flux. Computer simulation consisting of 33 elementary reactions was employed to make clear the mechanism of the HT oxidation. The computer simulation reproduced the same hydrogen pressure and photon flux dependences as the experimental results. It was revealed that the main path for HTO formation is as follows: 1) HT oxidation is initiated by photolysis of O3 to O(1D) radicals; 2) O(1D) radicals react with H2O(HT) to form OH(OT) radicals; 3) OH(OT) radicals produce H2O(HTO) by the reaction with H2(HT). On the basis of computer analysis, it is concluded that the considerable increase in the rate of HTO formation is due to the increase in O(1D) production in the presence of O3. The present results suggest that the O3-assisted UV-stimulated HT oxidation is expected to be applicable to non-catalytic oxidation of tritium in thermonuclear fusion reactors.