Bulletin of the American Physical Society
APS March Meeting 2019
Volume 64, Number 2
Monday–Friday, March 4–8, 2019; Boston, Massachusetts
Session Y60: Iran, North Korea, and Nuclear ProliferationInvited Undergraduate
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Sponsoring Units: FPS Chair: Joel Primack, University of California, Santa Cruz Room: BCEC 258A |
Friday, March 8, 2019 11:15AM - 11:51AM |
Y60.00001: 2019 Szilard Lectureship Award recipient - Scientists and Today’s Struggles Against Nuclear Weapons: What Would Szilard Do? Invited Speaker: Zia Mian Long standing arms control and nonproliferation arrangements intended to forestall, halt, reverse and eventually eliminate nuclear weapons programs are unraveling and prospects for near-term progress on this critical issue appear bleak. Alongside ambitious plans for modernization and further development of nuclear arsenals and production complexes, for some states the conditions for nuclear weapons use seem to be broadening rather than shrinking. One potentially hopeful development, the 2017 United Nations Treaty on the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons, has elicited opposition rather than support from most nuclear-armed states. The turn away from restraint towards retrenchment of nuclear weapons and warfighting postures exposes some of the inherent contradictions in the project of arms control as a way to end the threat of nuclear war. This talk will look at what role scientists can play in the current conjuncture with a focus on lessons that might usefully be learned from the organizing initiatives involving Leo Szilard, a pioneer in efforts by physicists as citizen-scientists to transcend nationalism and to bring science and democracy to bear on the challenge of reducing and eliminating the risks from nuclear weapons. |
Friday, March 8, 2019 11:51AM - 12:27PM |
Y60.00002: Iran, North Korea, and the Renewed Challenge of Proliferation Invited Speaker: R Kemp Nuclear weapons are now a 70-year-old technology. Since that time, progress in science and technology has made access to nuclear weapons easier for all who might seek them—yet, interestingly, there has been less nuclear proliferation in the last four decades than in the first three; and the nuclear proliferation of recent years has occurred has a different character than the proliferation seen in the first half of the nuclear age. This puzzle can be largely explained by the politics of the international system; but technology has also played an important role. Technologies have shaping the actual and perceived capabilities of states; and has provided justifications and means for circumventing different systems of control. This talk examines the cases of Iran and North Korea as archetypes for understanding how technological change might impact proliferation in the future. Particular focus will be given to the impact of the gas centrifuge, which has enabled proliferation; detection of clandestine programs; and to emerging technologies and policies that might help limit, control, or reverse proliferation. |
Friday, March 8, 2019 12:27PM - 1:03PM |
Y60.00003: Verification of Denuclearization Invited Speaker: Alexander Glaser A possible denuclearization of North Korea presents a historic opportunity to eliminate a nuclear weapons program. A viable process is likely to proceed in several phases and depend on verification approaches that are considered adequate and effective by all parties. Even in the best case, however, North Korea will retain an arsenal of nuclear weapons for an extended period of time, possibly for many years or even a decade, which will pose additional unique verification challenges. In particular, North Korea may initially not want to reveal the storage locations of its nuclear warheads, warhead components, and long-range missiles because this could provide a target list for an attack. This talk discusses possible concepts and required technologies that would allow monitoring a residual nuclear arsenal while addressing North Korea’s security concerns and meeting the requirements of effective verification. |
Friday, March 8, 2019 1:03PM - 1:39PM |
Y60.00004: Can Neutrino Detectors Strengthen the Nonproliferation Regime? Invited Speaker: Rachel Carr For 40 years, physicists have explored the idea using neutrino detectors to monitor nuclear activities, especially reactor operations. The challenge is detecting these weakly interacting particles in detectors of reasonable size and cost in cases where their signals would add value to existing monitoring techniques. This talk surveys hypothetical neutrino use cases, including roles in verifying a nuclear test ban treaty, discovering undeclared reactors, monitoring fissile material production in known reactors, and providing information about nuclear waste products. Even with recent advances in neutrino detection, most of the applications remain strongly limited by basic physical or practical constraints. In a few cases, existing or foreseeable neutrino technology has potential to complement more conventional approaches. |
Friday, March 8, 2019 1:39PM - 2:15PM |
Y60.00005: Strengthening the Nonproliferation Regime Invited Speaker: Frank von Hippel In the US State Department’s 1946 Acheson-Lilienthal Report, the first official proposal for a nuclear-weapon-free world, three activities were identified as “dangerous”: uranium mining, plutonium separation and uranium enrichment. They are dual-use; they could be used to produce fuel for either nuclear reactors or nuclear weapons. The report therefore recommended that these activities be placed under ownership of an international Atomic Development Authority (ADA). The US and Soviet Union could not agree, however, on which would come first: US nuclear disarmament or verification that the Soviet Union did not have a nuclear-weapon program. Seven decades later, many countries mine uranium but only one non-nuclear-weapon state separates plutonium (Japan) and three (Brazil, Iran and Japan) have national enrichment plants while, as an alternative model, Germany, the Netherlands and the UK co-own a multinational enrichment company, URENCO, which owns the only enrichment plant in the United States. It may be too late for the ADA but perhaps it is not too late to phase out plutonium separation and national enrichment plants. |
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