"Of course you can't buy it directly, but in our daily lives, there are some things that can extract trace amounts of materials." He Xingzhou directly searched online for discarded smoke alarms.
"Smoke alarms have americium-241 in their probes, and americium-241 emits alpha particles. Take the americium-241 out of hundreds of smoke detectors and wrap them in aluminum foil. When the alpha particles hit the aluminum atoms in the foil When, a nuclear reaction occurs and neutrons are released.”
"In this way, the raw materials for the neutron gun used to hit the nuclear fuel rods are available."
He Xingzhou had already found the manufacturer of the smoke alarm on the Internet. He searched carefully in the manufacturer's information and found a manufacturer that contained americium-241 in the raw material of the probe. Then he went to a second-hand website and purchased hundreds of them wholesale.
"Is this okay?" the three roommates exclaimed, "Then this is just the raw material for the neutron gun, what about the material for the nuclear fuel rods?"
He Xingzhou continued: "The surface coating compound of old-fashioned gas lampshades contains thorium-232. Bombarding thorium with neutrons can produce uranium-233, which is the material of nuclear fission."
He bought those second-hand car lampshades on the second-hand Internet, and also bought hundreds of them.
"The nuclear raw materials extracted from these materials are very scarce, and it is impossible to create a nuclear reactor that can sustainably and stably generate electricity. But it is enough for me. I only need to produce a nuclear fission reaction." He Xingzhou said.
After hearing his words, the three roommates were really convinced. They didn't expect that he had even thought of this level.
"I suddenly believe that you may succeed!" Wang Jiahao said.
"The boss is really six, wait and see!" Feng Tao said with emotion.
"I have nothing to say, just wait for the nuclear reactor to appear!" Zhang Yang was also convinced.
He Xingzhou said: "I will ask you to help me when the time comes, such as refining raw materials and shooting videos."
"Leave it to us!" The three of them agreed immediately.
He Xingzhou started his own micro nuclear reactor manufacturing plan, and everything he bought online arrived one by one. Because they were all second-hand junk, he spent less than he budgeted.
These things were piled up in the entire dormitory. Since the roommates were all looking forward to He Xingzhou's masterpiece, they had no objection to it and even took the initiative to help.
In the dormitory, Wang Jiahao took his mobile phone and filmed He Xingzhou. They were making a video.
He Xingzhou said to the video: "Hello everyone, my name is He Xingzhou, and I am a student at Capital University of Science and Technology."
"Because I wanted to verify one of my ideas, I decided to build a miniature nuclear reactor myself. To this end, I wrote a complete experimental plan. The plan has been approved by the relevant departments. I would like to remind everyone that it is carried out Nuclear tests must be approved, so please do not conduct dangerous experiments without authorization."
"My reactor mainly consists of five structures, active zone, neutron reflection layer, control and regulation system, cooling system, and protective layer."
"Now I am taking the first step to collect materials for nuclear fission reactors. I have some second-hand smoke alarms here. In their detectors, there is a small amount of americium 241, which only makes the neutron reflection layer, which is the impact nuclear Raw materials atoms for neutron guns.”
"The following process will be carried out in the laboratory and will be cut out of the video because it cannot be disseminated casually."
In the laboratory, He Xingzhou used these waste materials to extract some americium-241.
He plans to produce a series of videos called "College Students Make Their Own Nuclear Reactors" while conducting experiments.
He deliberately registered an account on the video website Bilibili, with the ID name "Planet Builder", and then chose to publish his first video.
After the release, He Xingzhou stopped managing his account, but started his second step intensively, manufacturing the basic device of the reactor.
He Xingzhou's construction of a micro-nuclear fission reactor only attracted attention among his classmates for a few days and then disappeared.
In this era of information explosion, there are a lot of new things every day, and everyone thinks that He Xingzhou is just a whim and cannot successfully build a nuclear reactor, so after just a week, few people pay attention to this matter anymore.
The only ones who always pay attention are Zhang Boyan and other physics professors.
On station B, many video bloggers post videos every day, and most people see the videos of those big UP bloggers.
When new people post videos, they rarely have a chance to be seen.
The first video released by He Xingzhou only had four views. Moreover, these four clicks were all clicked by him and his roommates themselves, and there were no new viewers.
"This doesn't work, no one is watching this video!" Wang Jiahao is helping He Xingzhou edit the second video.
"Maybe everyone saw the title and thought it was fake. And there are no fans, and big data doesn't recommend it." He Xingzhou said, "No matter what, let's release the second issue first."
"The second video is called "College Student's Homemade Nuclear Reactor - Second Period, Creating an Active Reaction Zone in a Pressure Cooker"."
After the video was edited, He Xingzhou released the video again.
Since there are no fans, no one will watch this video when it is posted. However, new videos will enter the video editor's backend for review, and some resources will be promoted for videos that the video editor finds interesting.
He Xingzhou's video entered the backend of a video editor on the technology video channel.
"Recently, the UP owners of the technology channel are getting more and more stretched out their hips!" Video editor "Xiaomu" complained to his colleagues while working.
"There used to be a lot of content, but now it's all about mobile phone reviews and electric vehicle reviews, and there aren't any popular videos."
For editors, the more popular videos there are, the better the editor’s performance will be.
"That's it." said colleague "Ant", "The main reason is that the newcomers' creativity is too boring. They can't make anything other than follow the trend and make review videos of technology products. Naturally, they can't produce any hits."
While they were chatting, Xiaomu suddenly saw a new video appearing in the background: "College Student's Homemade Nuclear Reactor - Phase 2, Creating an Active Reaction Zone in a Pressure Cooker".
"Huh?" He had an impression of this video and had seen the first issue before.
He only watched it for a minute and then turned it off, because he thought the UP owner was just a clickbait, and why was he making a nuclear reactor? Isn't this funny? Who has this ability!
Moreover, the content of the first issue was also very boring. It was about refining certain elements. At that time, Xiaomu thought it was boring and false, so he did not promote it at all.
Seeing that he actually released the second issue today, Xiaomu curiously clicked in to take a look.
In the video, He Xingzhou's face appears. He is modifying a pressure cooker in the laboratory.
"Hello everyone, my name is He Xingzhou. In the last issue, we have extracted americium 341, the raw material for the neutron reflection layer. Today we are going to make the active zone, which is where the nuclear reaction occurs. The main raw materials we use are stainless steel. Two pressure cookers, a small water pump, an electric fan, a radiator, some small-diameter plastic pipes, and some conductive wires.”
"Can you make a nuclear reactor with this? Are you kidding me?" Although his first reaction was disbelief, Xiaomu became more curious about this video and continued to read on.
