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The Radiation Protection and Shielding Division is developing and promoting radiation protection and shielding aspects of nuclear science and technology — including interaction of nuclear radiation with materials and biological systems, instruments and techniques for the measurement of nuclear radiation fields, and radiation shield design and evaluation.
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ANS Student Conference 2025
April 3–5, 2025
Albuquerque, NM|The University of New Mexico
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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.”
L. G. Mooney
Nuclear Science and Engineering | Volume 44 | Number 2 | May 1971 | Pages 157-172
Technical Paper | doi.org/10.13182/NSE71-A19664
Articles are hosted by Taylor and Francis Online.
Calculations were performed to determine energy and angle distributions of the fission-product gamma ray, air-ground secondary gamma ray, and neutron fluence incident on structures resulting from the detonation of a representative intermediate-yield thermonuclear weapon 100 m above the ground. These energy and angle distributions were used as input data to the ANISN discrete ordinates code to calculate the penetration of the radiation through various thicknesses of type O-HW1 concrete. The production and transport of concrete capture gamma rays were calculated in tandem with the neutron transport. The penetration results were used to calculate the various radiation components at the center of a simple concrete blockhouse. The inside lengths and widths of the structure varied from 10 to 50 ft and the inside height was fixed at 10 ft. Wall and roof thicknesses varied from 6 to 60 in. The results of the calculations were expressed as structure protection coefficients (dose at the receiver per unit free-field dose). The neutron dose was found to contribute the highest fraction of the total dose for wall and roof thicknesses up to 12 in. For thicknesses of 18 in. and more, the airground secondary gamma rays and concrete capture gamma rays were found to dominate, becoming increasingly more important with increasing thickness. The relative magnitude of each component did not vary significantly with structure size; however, all components were found to decrease with an increase in structure size for a given wall and roof thickness.