Mediaspace scheduled maintenance: Aug 25, 2026 07:00 - 12:00 AM. During this time, videos will be temporarily unavailable. Check status updates.

Lecture

Introduction to Nuclear Engineering

In course

ME-464: Introduction to nuclear engineering

This course is intended to understand the engineering design of nuclear power plants using the basic principles of reactor physics, fluid flow and heat transfer. This course includes the following: Reactor designs, Thermal analysis of nuclear fuel, Nuclear ...

Description

This lecture covers the basics of nuclear engineering, focusing on nuclear reactions, chain reactions, and the nuclear fuel cycle. It explains the energy production through fission and fusion reactions, the role of neutrons in sustaining chain reactions, and the importance of delayed neutrons. The lecture also delves into criticality conditions, multiplication factors, and the concept of a self-sustained fission chain reaction. Additionally, it discusses the characteristics of fissile and fertile isotopes, the neutron life cycle, and the factors affecting reactor criticality. The presentation concludes with an overview of the nuclear fuel cycle, including fuel enrichment, reprocessing, and waste disposal.

This video is available exclusively on Mediaspace for a restricted audience. Please log in to MediaSpace to access it if you have the necessary permissions.

Instructors (3)

Official source

Ontological neighbourhood

Energy engineering

Nuclear power: Topics in nuclear power

Physics

Nuclear physics: Topics in nuclear physics

Related concepts (32)

Nuclear reactor

A nuclear reactor is a device used to initiate and control a fission nuclear chain reaction or nuclear fusion reactions. Nuclear reactors are used at nuclear power plants for electricity generation and in nuclear marine propulsion. Heat from nuclear fission is passed to a working fluid (water or gas), which in turn runs through steam turbines. These either drive a ship's propellers or turn electrical generators' shafts. Nuclear generated steam in principle can be used for industrial process heat or for district heating.

Thorium fuel cycle

The thorium fuel cycle is a nuclear fuel cycle that uses an isotope of thorium, , as the fertile material. In the reactor, is transmuted into the fissile artificial uranium isotope which is the nuclear fuel. Unlike natural uranium, natural thorium contains only trace amounts of fissile material (such as ), which are insufficient to initiate a nuclear chain reaction. Additional fissile material or another neutron source is necessary to initiate the fuel cycle. In a thorium-fuelled reactor, absorbs neutrons to produce .

Nuclear fuel

Nuclear fuel is material used in nuclear power stations to produce heat to power turbines. Heat is created when nuclear fuel undergoes nuclear fission. Most nuclear fuels contain heavy fissile actinide elements that are capable of undergoing and sustaining nuclear fission. The three most relevant fissile isotopes are uranium-233, uranium-235 and plutonium-239. When the unstable nuclei of these atoms are hit by a slow-moving neutron, they frequently split, creating two daughter nuclei and two or three more neutrons.

Spent nuclear fuel

Spent nuclear fuel, occasionally called used nuclear fuel, is nuclear fuel that has been irradiated in a nuclear reactor (usually at a nuclear power plant). It is no longer useful in sustaining a nuclear reaction in an ordinary thermal reactor and, depending on its point along the nuclear fuel cycle, it will have different isotopic constituents than when it started. Nuclear fuel rods become progressively more radioactive (and less thermally useful) due to neutron activation as they are fissioned, or "burnt" in the reactor.

Nuclear chain reaction

In nuclear physics, a nuclear chain reaction occurs when one single nuclear reaction causes an average of one or more subsequent nuclear reactions, thus leading to the possibility of a self-propagating series of these reactions. The specific nuclear reaction may be the fission of heavy isotopes (e.g., uranium-235, 235U). A nuclear chain reaction releases several million times more energy per reaction than any chemical reaction.

Related lectures (35)

Nuclear Fission: Total Cross Section Analysis

Analyzes the total cross section data for nuclear fission, covering energy dependence, transport, reactions, uncertainties, fission fragments, and radiological hazards.

Physics of Nuclear Reactors: Fundamentals and Advanced Concepts

Explores the fundamentals and challenges of nuclear reactors, covering neutron diffusion, fission, breeding, transmutation, and advanced technologies.

Neutron chain-reacting systems

Explores practical fission fuels, chain reactions, and multiplication factors in nuclear reactors.