ValnaoPlease drive carefully: scientists plan to transport volatile antimatter for first time
Paranoid FactoidA few thousand antimatter charged particles could be used as an implosive trigger for a fusion bomb.
you’re off by something like 15-18 orders of magnitude
This is old, but you get the idea. See section 3.5.
Fourth Generation Nuclear Weapons: Military effectiveness and collateral effects
The paper begins with a general introduction and update to Fourth Generation Nuclear Weapons (FGNW), and then addresses some particularly important military aspects on which there has been only limited public discussion so far. These aspects concern the unique military characteristics of FGNWs which make them radically different from both nuclear weapons based on previous-generation nuclear-explosives and from conventional weapons based on chemical-explosives: yields in the 1 to 100 tons range, greatly enhanced coupling to targets, possibility to drive powerful shaped-charge jets and forged fragments, enhanced prompt radiation effects, reduced collateral damage and residual radioactivity, etc.
The paper you linked says “1 microgram is sufficient to trigger one thermonuclear weapon” which corresponds to 6×10^17.
This makes your “few thousand” of by 14 orders of magnitude instead of 15, I bet you feel vindicated now.
For example, a device the size of a hand grenade with tons of TNT equivalent output
A man portable nuke has existed since the 60’s so it wouldn’t be a game changer.
LMAO, the little baby down voted you.
You’re getting the microgram statement from here. You miss the point. A millionth of a gram is feasible to make and contain right now. It was predicted by 2010 in the paper using CERN, and there are much better facilities producing since then.
You’re missing the point to be pedantic over a 20 year old paper. Because you originally thought I was arguing a pure antimatter weapon, which I wasn’t. Newer approaches reduce the antimatter requirements for such weapons even more.
This might make you wonder why antimatter is being transported around. The fact is, proposals to weaponize antimatter as a fusion trigger have been around for over 40 years, and the means to achieving that from a production and engineering standpoint seem a good bet to be available today.
Yes, but if you take the train or a private car you won’t be searched. To get it across international borders try smuggling among other cargo or by submarine, maybe even diplomatic courier.
gandalf_der_12teinteresting! i had wondered whether that exists. the wikipedia page on radionuclides seems to hint so since it gives 10 kg as a possible total mass of fissile material in a critical scenarion but i still had doubts till now.
