Retrotechtacular: Better Living Through Nuclear Chemistry
1 min read
Summary
The late 1950s were an optimistic time in America, with new technologies promising a future filled with miracles, including abundant nuclear power.
The Armour Research Reactor details the construction and operation of the world’s first privately-owned research reactor, built at the Illinois Institute of Technology by Atomics International.
The reactor was a 50,000-watt aqueous-homogenous design using a solution of uranyl sulfate in distilled water as its fuel, and it had a core of about a foot in diameter.
The stainless steel sphere was filled with 90 feet of stainless tubing to circulate cooling water through the core, and the reactor was installed in biological shielding made from super-dense iron ore concrete with walls of 5 feet thick as a safety precaution.
The control panels and instrumentation are particularly noteworthy, giving off Fallout vibes with controls located in the room with the reactor and technicians using Cutie Pie meters to insert samples into irradiation tubes.
Experiments included creating radioactive organic compounds for polymer research, radiation hardening of transistors, and manufacturing radionuclides for disease diagnosis and treatment.
