Nuclear Weapons
Gold has been proposed as a material for creating a salted nuclear weapon (cobalt is another, better-known salting material). A jacket of natural 197Au, irradiated by the intense high-energy neutron flux from an exploding thermonuclear weapon, would transmute into the radioactive isotope 198Au with a half-life of 2.697 days and produce approximately .411 MeV of gamma radiation, significantly increasing the radioactivity of the weapon's fallout for several days. Such a weapon is not known to have ever been built, tested, or used. Gold has been used in thermonuclear weapons as radiation mirrors within the secondary assembly. Ivy Mike used a thin layer of gold on the secondary casing walls to enhance the blackbody effect, trapping more energy in the foam to enhance the implosion.
The highest amount of 198Au detected in any United States nuclear test was in shot "Sedan" detonated at Nevada Test Site on July 6, 1962.
Read more about this topic: Isotopes Of Gold
Famous quotes related to nuclear weapons:
“You can’t be a Real Country unless you have A BEER and an airline—it helps if you have some kind of a football team, or some nuclear weapons, but at the very least you need a BEER.”
—Frank Zappa (1940–1993)