Plasma Focus Neutron Sources

Current and neutron scaling for megajoule plasma focus machines

In a 2007 paper Nukulin and Polukhin surmised from electrodynamical considerations that, for megajoule dense plasma focus devices, focus currents and neutron yield Yn saturate as the capacitor energy E0 is increased by increasing the capacitance C0. In contrast, our numerical experiments show no saturation; both pinch currents and Yn continue to rise with C0 although at a slower rate than at lo...

Production of Fast Neutron with a Plasma Focus Device

Before its demise DIANA Hi-TECH, LLC, demonstrated the use of two 50 kJoule Plasma Focus devices for the copius production of fast neutrons, x-rays and radio-isotopes. Such a device is suitable for fast neutron non invasive interogation of contra-band materials including hidden nuclear materials. It could be particularly useful for a fast and fail safe interogation of large cargo containers, or...

Small plasma focus as neutron pulsed source for nuclides identification.

In this paper, we present preliminary results on the feasibility of employing a low energy (2 kJ, 31 kV) plasma focus device as a portable source of pulsed neutron beams (2.45 MeV) generated by nuclear fusion reactions D-D, for the "in situ" analysis of substances by nuclear activation. This source has the relevant advantage of being pulsed at requirement, transportable, not permanently radioac...

Neutron Imaging at Spallation Neutron Sources

Neutron imaging is a powerful method for non-destructive investigations where the high penetration through metals and the high contrast for hydrogenous materials is exploited in particular. The complementary to X-ray studies is a clever alternative in many cases of scientific and industrial applications. Reactor based neutron sources are becoming less available, caused by the shutdown of aged f...

Neutron Sources for America’s Future