1900: A physics genius wandering around Europe

Chapter 700 Third-Generation Nuclear Weapons! Playing to Strengths and Avoiding Weaknesses! Gas Centrifugation! Who says I can't build an atomic bomb!
With the end of World War II, the world situation changed dramatically, gradually forming a "bipolar" world.

After learning that the Soviet Union had successfully detonated an atomic bomb, the United States felt its position was challenged and that it had to outdo the Soviet Union.

Therefore, the United States wanted to create a bomb that was "far more powerful than an atomic bomb".

The development of the "hydrogen bomb" was put on the agenda.

As early as the Manhattan Project, scientists conceived of using the ultra-high temperature and pressure generated by atomic bomb explosions to enable hydrogen nuclear fusion.

And that is the principle behind the hydrogen bomb.

Oppenheimer and his associates were excluded from the plan because they were all embroiled in a spy crisis at the time.

The person in charge of the hydrogen bomb project was Taylor, who had always been at odds with Oppenheimer.

Taylor was probably hurt too deeply by Hitler, which left him with psychological trauma.

He deeply resented anything that might threaten him and wanted to fight violence with violence.

With the experience gained from developing the atomic bomb, the hydrogen bomb experiment went very smoothly.

In January 1950, Truman officially approved the hydrogen bomb project.

In May 1951, the first hydrogen bomb was tested in the Pacific Ocean. Its power far exceeded that of the atomic bomb, proving the feasibility of the hydrogen bomb.

However, this hydrogen bomb had many problems and had no practical value in combat.

For example, it weighs an astonishing 62 tons, which no aircraft can carry.

Taylor then persuaded the US government to build a new laboratory specifically for optimizing the hydrogen bomb, which became the famous Livermore National Laboratory.

Taylor, as the project leader, naturally became the laboratory director.

In August 1953, the Soviet Union announced the successful test of a hydrogen bomb, but for various reasons, its yield was only 400,000 tons of TNT.

For a hydrogen bomb, this power is indeed a bit small.

As mentioned earlier, there is a theoretical limit to the yield of an atomic bomb, which is 50 tons of TNT.

However, there is no upper limit to the yield of a hydrogen bomb, and as a result, the Soviet Union's hydrogen bomb was not even as powerful as its atomic bomb.

But the Soviet Union's hydrogen bomb was usable in actual combat, which made the Americans very nervous.

As a result, hydrogen bomb development accelerated, and Taylor made extremely innovative improvements to the hydrogen bomb design. (Taylor configuration)

In March 1954, the United States tested its first true hydrogen bomb in the Pacific Ocean, with a yield of an astonishing 15 megatons of TNT.

This is absolutely terrifying.

Such power terrified the entire world.

Taylor was also naturally called the "father of the hydrogen bomb," finally matching his old rival, Oppenheimer, the "father of the atomic bomb."

Upon hearing this news, the Soviet Union immediately decided to surpass the United States.

Thus, the most powerful bomb in human history was born!
"The Tsar Bomba!"

When it was originally designed, its power was an astonishing 1.7 million tons.

However, Soviet scientists believed that this amount could cause irreversible damage to the Earth's environment, so it was eventually changed to 5000 million tons.

The Tsar Bomba was 8 meters long, 2.1 meters in diameter, and weighed only 27 tons, making it fully capable of combat.

Its success not only failed to provoke the situation, but also curbed the pursuit of equivalent quantities by major powers.

Because whether it's 5000 million tons or 1 million tons, the result is the same: once the two sides go to war, it will inevitably be a fight to the death.

Therefore, the US and the USSR tacitly stopped pursuing the yield of hydrogen bombs and instead designed more "efficient and practical" hydrogen bombs.

For example, making the hydrogen bomb "dirtier".

You might be wondering: how does a bomb relate to whether it's dirty or not?
Actually, the "dirt" here does not refer to cleanliness or messiness in daily life, but rather to the amount of nuclear radiation produced after the hydrogen bomb explosion.

The destructive power of an atomic bomb has four main aspects, among which the more particle radiation and radioactive dust it produces, the "dirtier" it is.

The same applies to the destructive power of hydrogen bombs.

To increase the nuclear radiation of the hydrogen bomb, scientists wrapped it with a layer of uranium-238.

We know that the power of a hydrogen bomb far exceeds that of an atomic bomb, and it can even cause uranium-238 to undergo nuclear fission, thereby releasing a huge amount of nuclear radiation.

This is the famous "three-phase bullet".

The term "three phases" refers to the three transformations that this nuclear weapon underwent: nuclear fission → nuclear fusion → nuclear fission.

The traditional hydrogen bomb is a two-stage bomb, namely nuclear fission-nuclear fusion.

Although the explosive power of a three-phase bomb is not as great as that of a high-yield hydrogen bomb, it can efficiently kill all living things and destroy the environment.

Therefore, it belongs to the category of "dirty bombs".

The most terrifying dirty bomb is undoubtedly the infamous cobalt bomb.

The principle of the cobalt bomb is similar to that of the three-phase bomb, except that the uranium-238 casing is replaced with cobalt-59.

Cobalt-59 absorbs neutrons produced by a hydrogen bomb explosion and becomes cobalt-60.

Cobalt-60 is an extremely potent radioactive element that produces gamma rays that can permanently damage the DNA of living organisms.

Moreover, its half-life is as long as 5 years, allowing it to exist in the atmosphere for a long time.

Szilard once declared:

"Detonating a single high-yield cobalt bomb in the atmosphere would wipe out all life on Earth."

This shows just how "dirty" cobalt bombs are.

For this reason, research on cobalt bombs is strictly prohibited internationally, and if discovered, such research would be considered an absolute enemy of the world.

By detecting changes in the concentration of cobalt-60 in the atmosphere, we can determine whether anyone is conducting research.

Later detection techniques were accurate to the atomic level.

In other words, if a certain area suddenly has a few more cobalt-60 atoms, it means there is an anomaly there, and the five major powers will immediately conduct a joint investigation.

Under such strict monitoring, cobalt bombs are currently only theoretical weapons of mass destruction.

However, there are always clever people in this world. Some scientists have proposed an extremely weakened version of the cobalt bomb, which is the famous neutron bomb.

In essence, a neutron bomb is a two-stage bomb, also known as a traditional hydrogen bomb.

However, due to its special design, it produces a much higher number of neutrons than a typical hydrogen bomb.

Therefore, the destructive power of a neutron bomb mainly comes from neutrons, rather than shock waves and thermal radiation.

Neutron bombs generally have very small yields and are mainly used for precision strikes in small areas.

It primarily kills living organisms by releasing large amounts of neutron radiation, causing minimal damage to various buildings and facilities.

One neutron bomb killed all the enemies inside the enemy's base, but the base itself remained unscathed.

Moreover, the released neutrons are all one-time releases, and there is no continuous pollution.

Therefore, the neutron bomb is also known as the "god of war on the battlefield," and is a tactical nuclear weapon with great practical value.

Conversely, there is the [Shockwave Bomb].

This is also a small hydrogen bomb that uses neutron absorption technology, resulting in very little neutron radiation released. It mainly relies on shock waves to kill the enemy.

Therefore, after the shockwave grenade is dropped, ground troops can even quickly and directly enter the explosion site to carry out cleanup work.

It is a very clean hydrogen bomb.

In summary, the development of nuclear weapons has gone through three generations.

The first generation was the traditional atomic bomb. Uranium bombs and plutonium bombs were technologically mature and had moderate destructive power.

The second generation is the hydrogen bomb. It has enormous power, and current development efforts are focused on miniaturization. It is also a weapon that major powers strongly prohibit from developing.

Small countries might not mind secretly developing atomic bombs, but if they dare to get involved in hydrogen bombs, they will surely perish.

The third generation refers to various new types of hydrogen bombs developed based on the second generation hydrogen bomb, such as three-phase bombs, neutron bombs, shock wave bombs, etc.

Third-generation weapons are designed to better utilize nuclear weapons in actual combat, rather than being solely for nuclear deterrence.
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That magnificent period of history flashed through Li Qiwei's mind.

And now, he is about to change all of that!
He clearly doesn't need to consider researching the hydrogen bomb at the moment; his goal can be achieved with the atomic bomb. The Pangu Project differed significantly from the Manhattan Project in its technological choices.

First, the selection of nuclear materials.

Although plutonium has a lower critical mass, this element has not yet been developed and is therefore unusable.

Riggiev didn't intend to get plutonium out ahead of time, because there was no need.

Thanks to his planning decades in advance, Shanhe Group has stored more than 5 tons of uranium ore.

This is an absolutely terrifying number.

When Western countries decide to build atomic bombs, they will likely be caught off guard.

"Where the hell is the uranium mine?"

Therefore, the Pangu Project only needs uranium-235.

The only thing to consider is how much weapons-grade uranium-235 can be purified.

This leads to the second improvement: the uranium-235 separation method.

After careful consideration, Ridgway's method of separation was drastically different from the three methods used in the Manhattan Project.

That is the famous [gas centrifugation method]!
Commonly known as the "drum washing machine separation method".

The principle behind this method is as follows:
First, solid uranium is converted into uranium hexafluoride gas.

The gas is then compressed into the cylinder of a high-speed rotating centrifuge.

Uranium-238 molecules are relatively heavy, and due to the difference in centrifugal force, they will gradually accumulate near the wall of the cylinder.

The content of uranium-235 in the gas near the axis increases.

Then, introduce the gas into another centrifuge and repeat the above operation.

As the gas passes through a series of centrifuges, uranium hexafluoride molecules of uranium-235 are gradually enriched.

Finally, once the prescribed concentration is reached, the uranium-235 is reduced back into the solution.

In later generations, the first impression of this method is that it is "power-intensive".

However, the energy consumption of gas centrifugation is only one-tenth that of gas diffusion, but its concentration coefficient is more than 100 times that of gas diffusion.

Therefore, European and American countries have gradually started using centrifugation to produce enriched uranium.

However, centrifugation also has a drawback: the power of a single centrifuge is very low, and it needs to be scaled up industrially to be effective.

A centrifuge plant typically requires tens of thousands or even hundreds of thousands of centrifuges to operate simultaneously.

(As for how the total power consumption compares to the gas diffusion method, experts can add their insights.)
Maintaining a large number of centrifuges in normal operation for a long period of time is the biggest technical challenge.

Li Qiwei is able to accept this.

We can simply hire more people to maintain it day and night.

Given Borneo's current resources, it does not yet have a sufficient number of qualified industrial workers.

But if it's just taking care of centrifuges, you can have as many people as you need.

Li Qiwei's biggest advantage is his large group of people, and he needs to make full use of this advantage and leverage his strengths to compensate for his weaknesses.

Therefore, the crude and cumbersome method of gas centrifugation is very suitable.

Most importantly, Ridgway began planning for this centrifuge decades ago.

This is why Hu Xizhong is considered an extraordinary talent.

Because he had absolutely no idea why his young master was making so many unsold cylinders.

"This doesn't look like a cannon barrel at all."

And now, they are finally going to be put to use.

In later generations, many small countries that wanted to secretly build atomic bombs used centrifugation to separate uranium-235, simply because it was a simple and crude method.

Gas diffusion and electromagnetic separation methods require highly precise components that are difficult to manufacture; nothing beats a washing tub.

The third difference is the type of atomic bomb.

To be on the safe side, Ridgway ultimately decided to choose the gun-type atomic bomb.

Anyway, he has enough uranium-235 reserves, so he's not afraid of failure and can test it at will.

Borneo at that time did not have the scientific foundation that the United States had at that time, and could not find more than 1000 scientists.

Therefore, a simple gun stance is the preferred choice.

With the talents of Qian Wushi and Yu Yinji, designing a gun design would have been a piece of cake.

There is absolutely no need for a large group of scientists.

Most importantly, with a super big shot like Li Qiwei in charge, everything is absolutely foolproof.

His goal is not to unify the world, so there is no need to consider implosion-type and various miniaturization methods for the time being.

It becomes clear if you think of the Borneo Academy of Sciences as a terrorist organization disguised as science.

As long as Ridgway had a few atomic bombs, regardless of their type, the deterrent effect would be the same.

As for the later hydrogen bomb and three-stage bomb
"Let's leave those more awesome designs to the Northern Continent."

My ideal is the stars and the sea.

Li Qiwei's gaze was far-reaching.

He knew that, given the size of Borneo, a few atomic bombs could not possibly provide a permanent reprieve.

If he faces a greater threat, he will have to turn to the north for help.

This is something he considered decades ago.

Therefore, he sees himself as a hidden dragon, stepping forward and striking when the true dragon is at its most dangerous and weakest.

Once the true dragon takes flight, it will in turn protect the hidden dragon.

In later times, a certain industrial Cthulhu superpower could purify 48 tons of weapons-grade uranium per year, with relatively controllable power consumption.

This number, cough cough.

At this point, the entire Pangu Project and all its key details have been outlined.

Li Qiwei is full of confidence!
In the beginning, he often had little figures popping into his mind, pointing fingers at his plans.

"The Pangu Project is utter nonsense and is doomed to failure!"

"The Manhattan Project in the United States cost so many resources and recruited so many scientists to succeed."

"What does Borneo have that gives it the right to build an atomic bomb?"

But now, Ridgway, through meticulous and precise analysis, has dissected the details of making the atomic bomb one by one.

Take the essence and discard the dross, and add some experience from later generations.

Success rate skyrockets!
This is the power of the world's leading scientific figure.

"What the Manhattan Project could build, I can build too; what the Manhattan Project couldn't build, I can still build!"

Qian Wushi and the others watched as the dean's expression changed constantly, their hearts pounding.

"The dean's aura is truly terrifying!"

"I feel like he's going to destroy the world!"

That was an aura of domineering arrogance and composure that scorned everything, even the heavens and earth were trampled underfoot, and the great Dao was obliterated.

At this moment, Li Qiwei finally spoke:

"The Pangu Project is mainly divided into three steps."

(End of this chapter)