Sunday, May 15, 2011
Tuesday, April 26, 2011
Friday, April 1, 2011
Saturday, March 19, 2011
Japanese nuclear fallout reaches US
(Physics In the News!)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SWTP6al-b5E&feature=related
RADIOACTIVE fallout from Japan's crippled nuclear plant has reached Southern California, but the first readings are far below levels that could pose a health hazard, a diplomat says.
The diplomat, who has access to radiation tracking by the UN's Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty Organisation (CTBTO), cited readings from a California-based measuring station of the group.
Initial readings are "about a billion times beneath levels that would be health-threatening", the diplomat told AP, speaking on condition of anonymity because the CTBTO does not make its findings public.
The organisation forecast earlier this week that some radioactivity would reach Southern California by yesterday.
A CTBTO graphic obtained on Thursday by AP showed a moving plume reaching the US mainland after racing across the Pacific and swiping the Aleutian Islands.
The diplomat's comments backed up expectations by International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) officials and independent experts that radiation levels - which are relatively low outside of the immediate vicinity of the Japanese plant - would dissipate so strongly by the time it reached the US coastline that it would pose no health risk whatsoever to residents.
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While set up to monitor atmospheric nuclear testing, the CTBTO's worldwide network of stations can detect earthquakes, tsunamis and fallout from nuclear accidents such as the disaster on Japan's north-eastern coast that was set off by a massive earthquake and a devastating tsunami a week ago.
Since then, emergency crews have been trying to restore the Fukushima Dai-ichi nuclear plant's cooling system and prevent overheated fuel rods from releasing massive doses of radioactivity.
Japanese officials yesterday reclassified the rating of the accident at the plant from Level 4 to Level 5 on a seven-level international scale, putting it on par with the 1979 Three Mile Island accident in the US.
The International Nuclear Event Scale defines a Level 4 incident as having local consequences and a Level 5 as having wider consequences.
Nuclear experts have been saying for days Japan was underplaying the severity of the nuclear crisis.
Yukiya Amano, the head of the Vienna-based IAEA, left for Tokyo on Thursday to assess the situation. He plans to return at the weekend and to brief the IAEA's 35-nation board in an emergency session on Monday.
In Geneva, the World Health Organisation said Tokyo's radiation levels are increasing but are still not a health risk, and the group sees no reason to ban travel to Japan because of its nuclear crisis.
WHO spokesman Gregory Hartl said on Friday the organisation "is not advising travel restrictions to Japan" outside the 30-km exclusion zone around the nuclear complex.
Hartl said that includes Tokyo, where "radiation levels have increased very slightly, but are still well below the absolute levels of radiation where it would be considered a public health risk".
He also said: "In general travellers returning from Japan do not represent a health hazard."
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SWTP6al-b5E&feature=related
RADIOACTIVE fallout from Japan's crippled nuclear plant has reached Southern California, but the first readings are far below levels that could pose a health hazard, a diplomat says.
The diplomat, who has access to radiation tracking by the UN's Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty Organisation (CTBTO), cited readings from a California-based measuring station of the group.
Initial readings are "about a billion times beneath levels that would be health-threatening", the diplomat told AP, speaking on condition of anonymity because the CTBTO does not make its findings public.
The organisation forecast earlier this week that some radioactivity would reach Southern California by yesterday.
A CTBTO graphic obtained on Thursday by AP showed a moving plume reaching the US mainland after racing across the Pacific and swiping the Aleutian Islands.
The diplomat's comments backed up expectations by International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) officials and independent experts that radiation levels - which are relatively low outside of the immediate vicinity of the Japanese plant - would dissipate so strongly by the time it reached the US coastline that it would pose no health risk whatsoever to residents.
Start of sidebar. Skip to end of sidebar.
End of sidebar. Return to start of sidebar.
make your own news service on igoogle
While set up to monitor atmospheric nuclear testing, the CTBTO's worldwide network of stations can detect earthquakes, tsunamis and fallout from nuclear accidents such as the disaster on Japan's north-eastern coast that was set off by a massive earthquake and a devastating tsunami a week ago.
Since then, emergency crews have been trying to restore the Fukushima Dai-ichi nuclear plant's cooling system and prevent overheated fuel rods from releasing massive doses of radioactivity.
Japanese officials yesterday reclassified the rating of the accident at the plant from Level 4 to Level 5 on a seven-level international scale, putting it on par with the 1979 Three Mile Island accident in the US.
The International Nuclear Event Scale defines a Level 4 incident as having local consequences and a Level 5 as having wider consequences.
Nuclear experts have been saying for days Japan was underplaying the severity of the nuclear crisis.
Yukiya Amano, the head of the Vienna-based IAEA, left for Tokyo on Thursday to assess the situation. He plans to return at the weekend and to brief the IAEA's 35-nation board in an emergency session on Monday.
In Geneva, the World Health Organisation said Tokyo's radiation levels are increasing but are still not a health risk, and the group sees no reason to ban travel to Japan because of its nuclear crisis.
WHO spokesman Gregory Hartl said on Friday the organisation "is not advising travel restrictions to Japan" outside the 30-km exclusion zone around the nuclear complex.
Hartl said that includes Tokyo, where "radiation levels have increased very slightly, but are still well below the absolute levels of radiation where it would be considered a public health risk".
He also said: "In general travellers returning from Japan do not represent a health hazard."
Friday, March 18, 2011
Particle Physics (Definate Q on Higher Level Paper)
This is a great website...explains everything you need to know on particle physics
Its a guarantted question on the higher level paper and is well worth doing as you can pick up marks more easily than other questions...as there is only so many questions they can ask...
My advice....study this website (see link below)and attempt this question on paper.
http://homepage.eircom.net/~louiseboylan/index.html
Its a guarantted question on the higher level paper and is well worth doing as you can pick up marks more easily than other questions...as there is only so many questions they can ask...
My advice....study this website (see link below)and attempt this question on paper.
http://homepage.eircom.net/~louiseboylan/index.html
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