This is one video series I know I'm going to like. A lot of technical and reactor-y stuff being carefully laid out in front of us nerdy folk, in a clear and enjoyable manner. Can't wait to see the next episode. Well done! We may dispell people's fear of anything nuclear yet.
Very educational and straightforward! Thanks so much for making these videos. This might be a silly question-if fusion also releases energy, why don't fusion reactors (like Hydrogen reactors) exist yet?
Awesome, you're welcome! Fusion requires very high temperatures (millions of degrees) and pressures to do it, whereas fission reactors happen at much more normal pressures and temperatures (hundreds or thousands of degrees). So, fusion basically only happens (reliably) in stars and thermonuclear weapons at the moment. A few months back, the laser ignition facility in the US extracted some energy from fusion (albeit tiny) and there are many Tokamak type fusion plasma reactors that are in development around the world, with the biggest being ITER in France. But we're still a long way away from having production fusion reactors.
Yet again, thanks so much for your willingness to share your knowledge and experience in layman's terms "for the rest of us" :) Because "I" and I'm sure many others here don't always fully understand nuclear energy and its benefits or disadvantages. You really bring to light and simplify the importance of this topic. Thanks again!
Another great video! I’m annoyed (with myself) for not seeing it when it first came out! I’d love to see a video about transportation of nuclear materials and the challenges of designing flasks etc.
Whats a source I can find information on the Rancho Seco nuclear power plant? I've heard about all these mishaps that happened there from anti-nuke people but I want to SEE the official information.
the wikipedia article seems pretty even handed and links to official NRC reports, though i'm not sure how readable they may be to a layperson. It seems the third most serious American nuclear power accident happened there back in '78 en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rancho_Seco_Nuclear_Generating_Station
The atomic orbitals are indeed a quantum rim wonderland, but thinking of it as a probability distribution …it’s here, it’s there, is already too classical to be useful. For instance, they are entangled, and if you label one of the 92 electrons in a uranium atom, it’s not just here or there, it’s simultaneously all of the other 91 electrons at the same time. Weird. It’s worse in the nucleus, where a single proton is part all the protons. It’s also part all the neutrons too.
This content is type is great. Not being boxed into reaction (pun) style videos shows a open minded disposition that is likely beneficial in any field.
Thank you! Yes, it's almost out of necessity than anything else, I tend to get bored of things after a while haha but it has been a fight to try and get out of a box that RUclips doesn't want me to leave (for lack of a better phrasing).
@@TheAtomicAgeCM coming from the same fuel within the same reactor. I hope that makes sense. Or is there a variety of fission products coming from the same fuel source?
@@MrWils25 Let's see if I get your question. There is a distribution of which fission products are made, so one U-235 atom split in a reactor could make fission products A and B, for example, and the next U-235 atom split in that same reactor could make fission products C and D, and C and D could be twice as likely to be created as A and B (I'd have to look up some reactions for specific isotopes). And, the distribution of fission products for Uranium-235 is different than Plutonium-239.
I appreciate this greatly, considering getting my masters in NukeE. I work for a power company now. Would like to transfer out to South Carolina to our Nuke plants.
RUclips technical comment, but just wanna say your volume settings are great. One of the very few channels I can hear clearly without having to crank my phone. Thanks for the free teaching! I guess my only question is, I know most of the Latin element names; ehat the heck is Mercury?
well, thank you, and you're welcome! I've spent a good amount of time learning about it, so glad to hear (hehe) it's paying off. The mercury one I had to look up, from psanalytical.com: "Its chemical symbol (Hg) comes from hydrargyrum from the Greek word hydrargyros meaning 'water' and 'silver'."
Funny you ask, I briefly touch on that in the next video, but just because of a cool picture related to RTGs. But RTGs rely solely on the presence of radioactive Plutonium-238, which makes a lot of heat in part because of its short half life of 87 years. So, it's just heat from radioactive decay.
I just discovered your channel and am loving ❤️ it. Great stuff! Thank you for sharing your knowledge. My dad has a red uranium glazed vessel that reads 1,500+ cpm on my geiger counter. It's blazing. 10x hotter than any of my uranium glass... but from what I understand, it emits alpha waves, which are harmless from behind the glass of his curio cabinet.
thank you! you're welcome, I love sharing knowledge about this stuff. The glass does emit alphas (I have some as well for my upcoming wedding), and it's safe to hold in your hand, too. Skin (namely the outer dead layers) blocks alphas.
@TheAtomicAgeCM oh cheers! congrats on your wedding. It was such a relief to learn that it's harmless because it was a treasure from his childhood, and he's kept it close all these years. Imagine our surprise when we learned it was radioactive 😆. Have you ever done a video about everyday items that people don't know are radioactive? It would be interesting to hear your perspective. For instance, radium watches, uranium glazed tiles, smoke alarms, and I recently learned about tritium exit signs
After watching your videos and a few other people I wanna thank you for inspiring me to put my appreciation in for college, my whole life I felt as if it just wasn't necessary because there was never something I felt passionate about but you have shown me something that's changed my perspective on a lot of stuff, I applied for a bachelor's in science and engineering so I can try to become a nuclear engineer and I would never have wanted to do this if it weren't for you, thank you.
Wow, that's amazing! I don't know what to say, that's just so awesome. Best of luck to you, and feel free to reach out to me if you need advice on college!
@@TheAtomicAgeCM thank you, you and Tyler folse as well as Kyle Hill have all pretty much convinced me that nuclear is the future and I feel it's something that needs to start now before it's too little too late. So again thank you, for putting real knowledge and research onto such a known platform if it weren't for people like you, people like me would never find what drives them, so again thank you for helping me find my goal
Ever since you talked about closed vs open loop systems,, I’ve been curious… what would a radiator on car be considered? Closed loop when the thermostat is closed,, and open loop when it’s open?
Remind me of the context I spoke about open and closed loop? Just to make sure I'm not confusing myself lol. But until then, no I wouldn't consider a radiator open and closed loop, the thermostat is just different ways to control the temperature. So open loop and closed loop have to deal with control systems. I'm not sure I remember their formal definitions, but I'll give you another car example. If you're cruising down the highway at a steady speed, your engine is getting feedback from the O2 sensor about combustion and adjusting the fuel/air mix for optimal combustion (closed loop). If you floor it, things are changing too quickly to get that O2 sensor feedback, so your car instead switches to conservative fuel/air look-up tables (open loop) that do not combust optimally but are on the slightly richer side so your engine won't knock. In your example, I think the radiator/thermostat system is always closed loop, but I'm honestly not sure haha it's been so long since I've studied that stuff. I just remember the car thing from the two automotive engineering courses I took in college (and I'm also a car enthusiast).
@@TheAtomicAgeCM I think you first talked about it during the K19 episode?? I’ll have to go back and watch again.. thanks for the car analogy! Very interesting…
you're welcome. oh ok, maybe i was talking about feedback loops, so like negative and positive feedback loops. negative is self correcting (well designed nuclear reactors), and positive adds to itself, like a nuclear bomb
Are the credits for this course transferable?
This is one video series I know I'm going to like. A lot of technical and reactor-y stuff being carefully laid out in front of us nerdy folk, in a clear and enjoyable manner. Can't wait to see the next episode. Well done! We may dispell people's fear of anything nuclear yet.
Very educational and straightforward! Thanks so much for making these videos. This might be a silly question-if fusion also releases energy, why don't fusion reactors (like Hydrogen reactors) exist yet?
Awesome, you're welcome! Fusion requires very high temperatures (millions of degrees) and pressures to do it, whereas fission reactors happen at much more normal pressures and temperatures (hundreds or thousands of degrees). So, fusion basically only happens (reliably) in stars and thermonuclear weapons at the moment. A few months back, the laser ignition facility in the US extracted some energy from fusion (albeit tiny) and there are many Tokamak type fusion plasma reactors that are in development around the world, with the biggest being ITER in France. But we're still a long way away from having production fusion reactors.
Yet again, thanks so much for your willingness to share your knowledge and experience in layman's terms "for the rest of us" :) Because "I" and I'm sure many others here don't always fully understand nuclear energy and its benefits or disadvantages. You really bring to light and simplify the importance of this topic. Thanks again!
That's so very kind of you, and what a heartfelt thing to say! Thank you so much, and you're quite welcome.
An educated person that dumbs it down for people like me that know NOTHING about this line of work.
I embarrassedly just realized I forgot basic chemistry 😮 Thank you for this lesson! ❤
That's ok - it was probably too tangential anyway but glad you got something from it! You're welcome.
love ur vids as always, huge thanks to you for making content like this.
well thank you! and you're quite welcome
Thanks. Waiting for more.
Another great video! I’m annoyed (with myself) for not seeing it when it first came out!
I’d love to see a video about transportation of nuclear materials and the challenges of designing flasks etc.
thank you! no sweat, just been out a few days :)
A nuclear transport presentation could be cool, should be a bit shorter than the reactor one.
Ok. Trying for some higher learning. Hopefully this won’t look completely like a foreign language.
haha let me know how it goes
Thanks!
You're welcome, Hiltibrant! And, thanks so much!
Is the presentation assuming a knowledge of thermodynamics? If not, a mention of needing to measure temperature on an absolute scale...
no, no thermodynamics knowledge is assumed. did i gloss over something in the presentation with needing an absolute scale?
Whats a source I can find information on the Rancho Seco nuclear power plant? I've heard about all these mishaps that happened there from anti-nuke people but I want to SEE the official information.
the wikipedia article seems pretty even handed and links to official NRC reports, though i'm not sure how readable they may be to a layperson. It seems the third most serious American nuclear power accident happened there back in '78 en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rancho_Seco_Nuclear_Generating_Station
The atomic orbitals are indeed a quantum rim wonderland, but thinking of it as a probability distribution …it’s here, it’s there, is already too classical to be useful. For instance, they are entangled, and if you label one of the 92 electrons in a uranium atom, it’s not just here or there, it’s simultaneously all of the other 91 electrons at the same time. Weird.
It’s worse in the nucleus, where a single proton is part all the protons. It’s also part all the neutrons too.
oof, yeah it's a doozy lol
This content is type is great. Not being boxed into reaction (pun) style videos shows a open minded disposition that is likely beneficial in any field.
Thank you! Yes, it's almost out of necessity than anything else, I tend to get bored of things after a while haha but it has been a fight to try and get out of a box that RUclips doesn't want me to leave (for lack of a better phrasing).
Super interesting - thanks for such a great overview!
you're welcome! glad you liked it
When atoms are split in a reactor, are the fission products consistently the same isotope throughout the process?
Sorry, what do you mean? Does every atom split into the same two fission products?
@@TheAtomicAgeCM coming from the same fuel within the same reactor. I hope that makes sense. Or is there a variety of fission products coming from the same fuel source?
@@MrWils25 Let's see if I get your question. There is a distribution of which fission products are made, so one U-235 atom split in a reactor could make fission products A and B, for example, and the next U-235 atom split in that same reactor could make fission products C and D, and C and D could be twice as likely to be created as A and B (I'd have to look up some reactions for specific isotopes). And, the distribution of fission products for Uranium-235 is different than Plutonium-239.
I appreciate this greatly, considering getting my masters in NukeE. I work for a power company now. Would like to transfer out to South Carolina to our Nuke plants.
Nice! I think that is something I'd like to do as well one day.
RUclips technical comment, but just wanna say your volume settings are great. One of the very few channels I can hear clearly without having to crank my phone.
Thanks for the free teaching! I guess my only question is, I know most of the Latin element names; ehat the heck is Mercury?
well, thank you, and you're welcome! I've spent a good amount of time learning about it, so glad to hear (hehe) it's paying off. The mercury one I had to look up, from psanalytical.com: "Its chemical symbol (Hg) comes from hydrargyrum from the Greek word hydrargyros meaning 'water' and 'silver'."
Just curious, but what kind of chain reaction, if any, does an RTG rely on?
Funny you ask, I briefly touch on that in the next video, but just because of a cool picture related to RTGs. But RTGs rely solely on the presence of radioactive Plutonium-238, which makes a lot of heat in part because of its short half life of 87 years. So, it's just heat from radioactive decay.
I just discovered your channel and am loving ❤️ it. Great stuff! Thank you for sharing your knowledge. My dad has a red uranium glazed vessel that reads 1,500+ cpm on my geiger counter. It's blazing. 10x hotter than any of my uranium glass... but from what I understand, it emits alpha waves, which are harmless from behind the glass of his curio cabinet.
thank you! you're welcome, I love sharing knowledge about this stuff. The glass does emit alphas (I have some as well for my upcoming wedding), and it's safe to hold in your hand, too. Skin (namely the outer dead layers) blocks alphas.
@TheAtomicAgeCM oh cheers! congrats on your wedding. It was such a relief to learn that it's harmless because it was a treasure from his childhood, and he's kept it close all these years. Imagine our surprise when we learned it was radioactive 😆. Have you ever done a video about everyday items that people don't know are radioactive? It would be interesting to hear your perspective. For instance, radium watches, uranium glazed tiles, smoke alarms, and I recently learned about tritium exit signs
After watching your videos and a few other people I wanna thank you for inspiring me to put my appreciation in for college, my whole life I felt as if it just wasn't necessary because there was never something I felt passionate about but you have shown me something that's changed my perspective on a lot of stuff, I applied for a bachelor's in science and engineering so I can try to become a nuclear engineer and I would never have wanted to do this if it weren't for you, thank you.
Wow, that's amazing! I don't know what to say, that's just so awesome. Best of luck to you, and feel free to reach out to me if you need advice on college!
@@TheAtomicAgeCM thank you, you and Tyler folse as well as Kyle Hill have all pretty much convinced me that nuclear is the future and I feel it's something that needs to start now before it's too little too late. So again thank you, for putting real knowledge and research onto such a known platform if it weren't for people like you, people like me would never find what drives them, so again thank you for helping me find my goal
I'm curious to know how you think reactors could and should fit into the grid. Controversial, but useful.
what do you mean? they're already in the grid?
Are you speaking of SMRs or large plants ?
Thanks again Charlie, love this nuclear learning sir ❤
You're welcome! Glad to hear it
Ever since you talked about closed vs open loop systems,, I’ve been curious… what would a radiator on car be considered? Closed loop when the thermostat is closed,, and open loop when it’s open?
Remind me of the context I spoke about open and closed loop? Just to make sure I'm not confusing myself lol. But until then, no I wouldn't consider a radiator open and closed loop, the thermostat is just different ways to control the temperature. So open loop and closed loop have to deal with control systems. I'm not sure I remember their formal definitions, but I'll give you another car example. If you're cruising down the highway at a steady speed, your engine is getting feedback from the O2 sensor about combustion and adjusting the fuel/air mix for optimal combustion (closed loop). If you floor it, things are changing too quickly to get that O2 sensor feedback, so your car instead switches to conservative fuel/air look-up tables (open loop) that do not combust optimally but are on the slightly richer side so your engine won't knock.
In your example, I think the radiator/thermostat system is always closed loop, but I'm honestly not sure haha it's been so long since I've studied that stuff. I just remember the car thing from the two automotive engineering courses I took in college (and I'm also a car enthusiast).
@@TheAtomicAgeCM I think you first talked about it during the K19 episode?? I’ll have to go back and watch again.. thanks for the car analogy! Very interesting…
you're welcome. oh ok, maybe i was talking about feedback loops, so like negative and positive feedback loops. negative is self correcting (well designed nuclear reactors), and positive adds to itself, like a nuclear bomb