Plutonium-238 can be used to make isotope batteries, which are widely used as a source of energy for spacecraft, artificial satellites, and polar weather stations. Plutonium-238 emits only alpha rays when it decays and has few spontaneous fission neutrons, making it the most important nuclide used in isotope batteries.
Plutonium, atomic number 94, is an artificial radioactive element with an element name modeled after uranium and neptunium named after Pluto. Plutonium is after neptunium after the second discovery of transuranic elements, in late 1940, American scientists Siborg, McMillan and other American scientists in the United States with a 60-inch cyclotron accelerated deuterium 16 megaelectronvolts bombardment of uranium found plutonium-238.
Plutonium its stable isotope is plutonium-244, half-life is about eighty million years. Plutonium-238, on the other hand, has a half-life of 87.74 years, and when it decays, it releases alpha particles and a great deal of heat, which makes it capable of spontaneous combustion under certain conditions, even in very small quantities. 1 kilogram of plutonium-238 produces as much heat as a 570-watt electric stove, and it continues to do so for decades, without interruption.
Expanded Information
In the field of deep-space exploration, there are two types of isotope-heating equipment, one called a "radioisotope heater" (or RHU for short) and the other called a "radioisotope thermoelectric machine One is called "Radioisotope Heater" (RHU) and the other is called "Radioisotope Thermal Generator" (RTG).
While the RHU is used only to heat and insulate equipment, the RTG's ability is to turn the heat generated by fissioning isotopes into electrical power to power places where the sun cannot be seen, or for deep space exploration.
Human research into the use of plutonium began during World War II. In the postwar Cold War era, when the U.S. and the Soviet Union were battling for supremacy in space, a large number of satellites and spaceships used isotopic nuclear batteries of radioactive plutonium-238, including the famous Apollo moon landing spacecraft.
After the end of the Cold War and the collapse of the former Soviet Union, demand for these radioactive isotopes slowed, and the United States suspended its plutonium production line in the mid-1990s, switching to buying from Russia.
But because NASA has a huge deep-space exploration program: the Huygens probe, several Mars rovers, Mars rovers, and the Pluto rover all use nuclear batteries, the Americans restarted their plutonium production line in 2010, and the U.S. is now able to produce about 2 kilograms of plutonium per year, which is used to satisfy the U.S.'s need for "nuclear batteries" and other scientific tests.
The U.S. can now produce about 2 kilograms of plutonium per year, which can be used to meet the demand for U.S. "nuclear batteries" and other scientific tests.
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