What is a common use for plutonium?

Answer 1

Applications of plutonium:

• explosive in nuclear weapons

• nuclear fuel in nuclear power reactors

• the isotope 238Pu is used as energy source in spacecrafts or other applications (radioisotope thermoelectric generators); the chemical form is plutonium dioxide.

• neutron generator, as Pu-Be source

Answer 2

Plutonium is used to make nuclear weapons and nuclear fuel.

Plutonium was first produced by Glenn T. Seaborg, Joseph W. Kennedy, Edward M. McMillan and Arthur C. Wohl by bombarding an isotope of uranium, uranium-238, with deuterons that had been accelerated in a device called a cyclotron. This created neptunium-238 and two free neutrons. Neptunium-238 has a half-life of 2.1 days and decays into plutonium-238 through beta decay. Although they conducted their work at the University of Californiain 1941, their discovery was not revealed to the rest of the scientific community until 1946 because of wartime security concerns.

Plutonium's most stable isotope, plutonium-244, has a half-life of about 82,000,000 years. It decays intouranium-240 through alpha decay. Plutonium-244 will also decay through spontaneous fission.

Only two of plutonium's isotopes, plutonium-238 and plutonium-239, have found uses outside of basic research. Plutonium-238 is used in radioisotope thermoelectric generators to provide electricity for space probes that venture too far from the sun to use solar power, such as the Cassini and Galileo probes. Plutonium-239 will undergo a fission chain reaction if enough of it is concentrated in one place, so it is used at the heart of modern day nuclear weapons and in some nuclear reactors.

Answer 3

so far it is rather exclusively used for bombs and heat sources for steam engines. There is some research into capturing the energy released by fission in a more efficient manner, but it is slow and expensive and under rather high security, so we as the general public probably won't hear much of the results. More rare use is slow poison, possible fire starter when flaked or powdered, although the handling precautions are rather prohibitive.

Answer 4

Applications of plutonium: * explosive in nuclear weapons * nuclear fuel in nuclear power reactors * the isotope 238Pu is used as energy source in spacecrafts or other applications (radioisotope thermoelectric generators); the chemical form is plutonium dioxide. * neutron generator, as Pu-Be source

Answer 5

Applications of plutonium: * explosive in nuclear weapons * nuclear fuel in nuclear power reactors * the isotope 238Pu is used as energy source in spacecrafts or other applications (radioisotope thermoelectric generators); the chemical form is plutonium dioxide. * radioisotopic heating sources * neutron generator, as Pu-Be source

Answer 6

Some applications of plutonium include:

• explosive in nuclear weapons

• nuclear fuel in nuclear power reactors

• the isotope 238Pu is used as energy source in spacecrafts or other applications (radioisotope thermoelectric generators); the chemical form is plutonium dioxide.

• neutron generator, as Pu-Be source

Answer 7

Applications of plutonium:

• explosive in nuclear weapons

• nuclear fuel in nuclear power reactors

• the isotope 238Pu is used as energy source in spacecrafts or other applications (radioisotope thermoelectric generators)

• neutron generator, as Pu-Be source

Answer 8

Plutonium is a fissionable (fissile) material, and that makes it useful as a nuclear fuel and as the primary component in nuclear weapons.

Answer 9

It is used in radioisotope electric generators, used in space shuttles that get too far from the sun to resive enough solar energy to run properly.