It's so big, the strong force can't hold it together very well,” she said. “You have a very large nucleus like uranium that is barely holding together. Understanding the strong force helps explain fission. If you can build a bomb that kind of plays around with releasing energy from these nuclear forces, you can build something very powerful indeed.” Basically, fractions of a distance across a single proton or a neutron. Thaller, known for her hosting of the Science Channel show, How the Universe Works, explained, “We don't notice these forces in our everyday life because they are felt only over tiny, tiny scales. Neutrons are particularly important because they have no charge - and thus no repelling energy - but provide strong force, serving as a “glue” that keeps the nucleus together. So if you think about two protons trying to repel each other because they have similar positive charges, the strong force is about 100 times stronger than the electric propulsion.” That is why protons and neutrons bind together in the nucleus of an atom. “The strong force is about 100 times stronger than the electromagnetic force. So, if gravity is 1, this strong force would be 10 to the 38th - that’s a 1 with 38 zeros behind it,” she said. “The strong force is named because it is a very strong force. The atoms in our body repel the atoms in a chair and the ground and “we don’t just fall through the chair, all the way into the center of the Earth.”īut the really powerful forces are two that we never see: the strong and weak nuclear forces. That’s a 1 followed by 36 zeros.”Įlectromagnetism is why we are able to exist. It keeps the earth orbiting around the sun and it keeps us on the surface of the earth,” she said, but electromagnetism “is much, much stronger. “Gravity seems like a pretty strong force. There are four fundamental forces in nature, Thaller told me. This all has to do with this thing called the strong force.” If I take an atom and I put it together, I get energy. “So, if I take the atom and rip it apart, I get energy. “One of my naive questions as a kid was how can you get energy from both splitting atoms apart and putting them together?” said Thaller. Michelle Thaller explained the science of nuclear explosions this week on the national security podcast, Press The Button. How exactly does this work? Where does the energy come from? NASA Astrophysicist Dr. The hydrogen bomb, first tested by the United States and then the Soviet Union in the early 1950’s, uses the heat, radiation and pressure of the atomic bomb to force atoms of hydrogen together, releasing by this fusion even greater energy than by fission. The atomic bomb, first tested on July 26, 1945, gets its explosive force from a fast neutron chain reaction that splits a trillion trillion uranium atoms in a microsecond. Most national security experts are familiar with fission and fusion. What makes nuclear weapons different from every other weapon? As we approach the 75th anniversary of the testing of the first atomic bomb, it is worth taking a closer look at the most powerful weapon ever invented. Listen to the whole episode on Press the Button. By Joe Cirincione, originally published in The National Interest.
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