3 ms·
AGM2015: Antineutrino Global Map 2015
- api 5y agoIf we got really really good at imaging the antineutrino flux, is it possible that we could detect the presence of not only nuclear reactors but nuclear weapons? Could we implement almost physically impossible to evade nuclear weapon detection at ports and in major cities to make nuclear terrorism almost impossible?
- graderjs 5y agoI think we already have this
- _Microft 5y agoThis is not measured data but expected total antineutrino emissions according to the model that they created ((anti)neutrinos come in three different flavors and can oscillate between them). It looks like they modeled different sources like Earth's crust, mantle and artificial sources (nuclear reactors) separately, e.g. by using known distributions and ratios of radioactive elements or locations and power of nuclear reactors and in one case actual measurements by detectors in Italy and Japan. They then ran simulations on this and summed up the total flux in different energy ranges ("bins"). https://www.nature.com/articles/srep13945#Sec7 https://www.nature.com/articles/srep13945#Sec7
- jjk166 5y agoI'm rather surprised that man-made reactors account for 1% of all neutrino flux, especially with only about 10% of world power production coming from nuclear power. Obviously reactors release neutrinos at a much higher rate than natural decay, but there is only about about 10^5 tons of uranium in the worlds reactors compared to around 10^15 tons in the earth, and there are a lot more radioactive elements in Earth than just uranium.