High-brightness γ ray and its application for nuclear transmutation

Abstract

In this article, a generation of high brightness 'r ray and its application to transmutation of nuclear waste is discussed. The recent development of laser and optical technology allows us to storage the photons in a cavity. The interaction of electron beam with the storage photon field makes an enhancement of generation of high brightness r ray. Such y ray with high efficiency of generation is expected to use interesting applications as nuclear transmutation which has been studied at ILT. The result shows this methods promising.We performed a small scale experiment with the low energy electron beam and accumulated photon in a super cavity. This results corresponded quite well to the predicted one from cavity storage rate and electron beam energy.

Laser Compton back-scattering gamma-ray beamline on NewSUBARU

“…In order to dispose of nuclear waste composed of long-lived fission products, a concept of shortening their long radioactive life by transmuting their nuclei to an unstable isotope through irradiation by laser-Compton scattering gamma-ray, which is based on a storage ring, was proposed in recent years (Imasaki and Moon, 2000;Aoki et al, 2002). The concept points out the conversion efficiency of nuclear transmutation, induced by the gamma-ray photons coupling to nuclear giant resonance of a certain material .…”

“…Generation and applications of gamma-ray source are studied on NewSUBARU, 1-1.5 GeV electron storage ring (Ando et al, 1998;Miyamoto et al, 2002). One of the applications is a basic experiment for a transmutation in the disposal of radioactive waste (Imasaki and Moon, 2000), which is required in the future. In this process, ( , n) photo nuclear reaction will be used to change the long life radioactive isotopes to the short life or the stable isotopes.…”

A potential photo-transmutation of fission products triggered by Compton backscattering photons

“…With the improvement of laser and accelerator techniques, many g-ray sources based on Compton backscattering (CBS) process were or are being constructed around the world [11][12][13][14][15][16][17], which can also produce g photons to trigger the photonuclear reaction for transmutation of radioactive waste [18]. The Shanghai…”

Prospects of High Power Laser Applications

“…This program is going by ILT and NASDA Japan. 32) As for the debris removal in space, phase conjugate power beams are prepared which will installed on the satellite. The probe beams irradiate the debris targets and the reflective lights are detected to drive the power conjugate beams which eliminate the debris in space.…”

“…But using a super cavity of high Q, it is possible to accumulate the high field by conventional lasers. 22) As the preliminary experiment, the New Subaru electron storage ring whose energy 1 GeV, electric current 1 A average, 200 A peak and energy spread 0.1 % is used for the beam source. In a super cavity of radiation accumulator, the stored energy is 10 MW where cavity length 10 m and reflectivity 99.9 % respec- Fig.…”