Nuclear 101: How Nuclear Bombs Work Part 1/2

I get to listen to a lecture from one of the most prestigious universities in the world for free, and I can pause and rewind it at my whim. Think about that for a second...!

thanks for putting me on the NSA watchlist

I am a physicist and this is one of the clearest and well organised explanation to the layman and scientist on this topic - excellent presentation.

This professor is such a great speaker. Easy to understand even if you are not physics major.

Black SUV just pulled up next to my house.

kim was lit when his boys found this

Why am I mesmerized by this deadly apocalyptic subject?

Can you imagine going back in time to WWII and telling people "you know that super secret tech you're all working on? Yeah... we call this Youtube"

Thanks James Cameron for an excellent 101 lecture.

my father was at Castle Bravo in 1954.

Never though I would get the basic understanding, well taught, not locked in explaining in complicated terms at all, so well delivered. Was always wondering how they can be sooo powerful, now that guessing can rest :P

A good portion of this info was in my course of study for a power reactor operator's license. Nice refresher.

If I wasn't on a list from all the other cap I watch.....I definitely am now

I'm building a bomb for my dad for his birthday and I want it to be big. However my yield seems to be consistently below the 50 kiloton mark even when I use enough material for a 100k or so bomb. I've got the hollow sphere and the air gap and the explosive lenses mostly dialled in, but still I end up with this figure "8" blast pattern that is not very optimal Can you please help? I only have enough fissile material for two more bombs so I can really have only one more test before I make the present.

56:35 Minor detail about hot air rising. I think he is mixing up cause and effect. You do not start with hot air rising and then colder air rushing in below to "prevent a vacuum". The hotter lighter air causes a lower pressure above the colder heavier air. This causes the cold air to be pushed up from its sides (as the side pressure around the cold air is higher than the pressure from above), which then in turn pushes the hot and lighter air upwards. Think about an air bubble under water. Water on the top of the bubble flows down on its sides and fills up the bottom of the bubble. The permanent movement of water from the top to the bottom makes the air rise up. There is no water rushing in from below to fill up any vacuum.

Trinity Slide @ 2:15 is not a picture of Trinity, but a picture of Shot Badger from the Upshot-Knothole series in 1953.

Fascinating. Great presentation.

so fascinating!!! i love learning about nuclear bombs!!

this vid just auto played when i was napping, just saying whomever might be spying on me lol

I grew up in the '60's and '70's, and while I missed the Civil Defense drills in schools, I had found a lot of books by the agencies in a landfill in the valley below our house, across the river from the US Naval Academy. Those books, plus reading "Triumph" by Philip Wylie, had me watching every contrail in the sky. Those neurosis-inducing nukes...... Test pilots would occasionally issue a sonic boom over the area, and one day a Harrier dropped in to hover over a parking lot at the Academy. The initial sonic boom and the subsequent roar had us running for cover..... like that does ANY good within ten miles of a nuke. Thanks for sharing this extremely well-done lecture.