Nuclear research reactors around the country, including the Massachusetts Institute of Technology Reactor (MITR), could switch to a low-enriched uranium fuel:
The US National Nuclear Security Administration (NNSA) has submitted to the US Nuclear Regulatory Commission a preliminary report on a new uranium fuel that will enable the conversion of six US research reactors from highly enriched uranium [HEU] to low-enriched uranium [LEU].
The preliminary report on uranium-molybdenum (U-Mo) monolithic fuel contains data about the performance of the new fuel in a reactor and how it perfoms under a variety of conditions.
The international community is working to minimise amounts of HEU material, which could potentially be used for nuclear weapons. To that end, programmes are under way to convert research reactors to the use of LEU fuel, which does not present a proliferation risk. In some cases - including six high-performance research reactors in the USA - this can mean designing a new LEU fuel.
(Score: 4, Informative) by Aiwendil on Thursday December 28 2017, @11:30PM (1 child)
http://news.mit.edu/2017/75th-anniversary-first-nuclear-fission-reactor-mit-re-enacts-seminal-experiment-1204 [mit.edu]
They restarted the Exponential Pile that was at MIT on the 75th aniversary of the CP-1
(Score: 1, Informative) by Anonymous Coward on Friday December 29 2017, @12:43AM
Hey, thanks for the link, while I'd lost track over the years, it turns out I grew up down the street from one of the MIT profs that was part of this anniversary celebration.