Arthur T Knackerbracket has found the following story:
Most nuclear data measurements are performed at accelerators large enough to occupy a geologic formation a kilometer wide, like the Los Alamos Neutron Science Center located on a mesa in the desert. But a portable device that can reveal the composition of materials quickly on-site would greatly benefit cases such as in archaeology and nuclear arms treaty verification.
Research published this week in AIP Advances, from AIP Publishing, used computational simulations to show that with the right geometric adjustments, it is possible to perform accurate neutron resonance transmission analysis in a device just 5 meters long.
"We expected massive backgrounds to dilute and contaminate our signal, and early simulation work confirmed that the scale of these effects would make the technique entirely impossible," author Areg Danagoulian said. "However, careful optimization of the geometries allowed us to almost completely suppress these effects, giving us a near-perfect signal."
Journal Reference:
Ezra M. Engel, Ethan A. Klein, Areg Danagoulian. Feasibility study of a compact neutron resonance transmission analysis instrument. AIP Advances, 2020; 10 (1): 015051 DOI: 10.1063/1.5129961
(Score: 2) by ikanreed on Thursday February 06 2020, @04:54PM (2 children)
In fact they just concentrated on a Monte Carlo simulation to refine the analysis algorithm.
(Score: 2) by FatPhil on Thursday February 06 2020, @08:52PM (1 child)
I used a simulation to show what they're doing is impossible.
Here's the source-code, so that you can run the simulation yourself and verify the result I get
#!/bin/sh
echo "You can't definitively say that something is possible or not in the real world just from a simulation. [FAIL]"
exit 1
Great minds discuss ideas; average minds discuss events; small minds discuss people; the smallest discuss themselves
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday February 07 2020, @02:25AM
Probably shouldn't tell you how rocket engines, particle accelerator calorimeters, etc. are designed then. It would blow your mind (oh yeah, MRI machines . . . )
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday February 07 2020, @12:07AM
gives amusing results.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday February 07 2020, @12:16AM
These are not the tricorders you are looking for.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday February 07 2020, @01:31PM
sure sure, new and better detectors for radiation are "a good thing(tm)".
however what is probably more important is a detector that reports if measurements are not reported ^_^