Nuclear threat detectors get an upgrade
Taking inspiration from an unusual source, a Sandia National Laboratories team has dramatically improved the science of scintillators — objects that detect nuclear threats. According to the team, using organic glass scintillators could soon make it even harder to smuggle nuclear materials through America’s ports and borders. The Sandia Labs team developed a scintillator made of an organic glass which is more effective than the best-known nuclear threat detection material while being much easier and cheaper to produce. Organic glass is a carbon-based material that can be melted and does not become cloudy or crystallize upon cooling. Successful results of the Defense Nuclear Nonproliferation project team’s tests on organic glass scintillators are described in a paper published this week in The Journal of the American Chemical Society. Sandia Labs material scientist and principal investigator Patrick Feng started developing alternative classes of organic scintillators in 2010. Feng explained he and his team set...