物理与天文2019pnas.org
2017年未申报重大核释放中的放射性钌
Radioactive ruthenium from an undeclared major nuclear release in 2017
入门 · 约 45 分钟读完前置知识：放射性核素与半衰期基础、大气扩散/气象常识
导读
这篇论文分析了 2017 年 10 月欧洲监测到的一场未申报的重大放射性钌-106 释放事件。研究通过遍布欧洲的监测数据反推释放源的位置和时间，结论指向俄罗斯南部（可能与核燃料后处理设施有关），且释放并非来自运行中反应堆的破损。
HN 关注点：科学家如何仅凭放射性监测数据反推出未申报核泄漏的来源，以及此前盛行的'俄罗斯核动力导弹试验坠毁'假说是否被推翻。
HN 评论精选
这几条评论里：支持 1 补充 2 亲历 1
支持论文数据反驳了'核动力导弹试飞坠毁'假说
我觉得最有意思的是，这些结果相当确凿地表明钌不可能来自运行中反应堆的破损。之前 HN 上有个帖子推测这次释放与俄罗斯测试核动力喷气式巡航导弹有关——试飞后坠毁会从其反应堆释放放射性物质。但这份报告强烈反驳了那个理论。
avian查看英文原文
The most interesting thing I find here is that these results seem pretty conclusive that ruthenium couldn't have come from a breach in an active reactor. There was a submission on HN a while ago (I can't find it right now) that speculated that this release was related to Russia testing a nuclear jet-powered missile. A crash after a test flight would release radioactive materials from its reactor. This report seems to strongly point against that theory.
补充赞叹放射性溯源技术，并感慨如今缺乏公开申报的义务感
能够沿半衰期和放射性核素链往回追溯，再结合风向、水流进行三角定位，锁定某个时间点的释放源……太厉害了。会不会有人公开承认？过去人们觉得有义务上报，现在似乎发生了文化转变，掌握信息的人不再觉得有报告的义务。我很好奇事发时设施附近居民的生活是什么样的，他们被告知了多少暴露情况？
ggm查看英文原文
The ability to walk back up a half-life and radionucleotide chain, and also map to wind, water flows, and so triangulate to a source at a given time.. Amazing stuff. Is it too much to hope, somebody is going to do some open declaration? In times past, people felt a compulsion to report. It feels like we have had a cultural shift, and whoever has information, feels no obligation to report. I wonder what life closer to the facility was like when this happened? How much did they get told about their exposure?
亲历亲历见闻：美国本土也有被掩盖的核污染泄漏事件
几年前迈阿密大学（俄亥俄）一位教授来我们机构做报告，讲她的学生如何在附近山谷意外发现高辐射水平。调查后他们追溯到一家冷战时期制备核原料的工厂，放射性尘埃随风影响了山谷下游数十英里的区域。当地居民 apparently 未被告知，该镇癌症发病率相对较高。他们的论文被拒稿，公开调查的呼吁也被搁置。我不确定现在情况如何，但如果有人感兴趣，联系那所大学环境科学系的教员应该不难。
noirchen查看英文原文
A few years ago a professor from the Miami University in Ohio came to our institution to give a talk about her students accidentally found high levels of radiation in a valley nearby. After some investigation they tracked down the source of radiation to a factory that prepared nuclear raw materials during the cold war. Some of the radiating dusts got carried by the wind and affected a region of tens of miles down in the valley. Apparently the locals in the valley town are not informed and the cancer rate is relatively high in the town. For some reason their papers on this are rejected, and calls for a public investigation were buried. I am not sure what the situation is now, but it would not be too difficult to contact some faculties of environmental sciences in that university if anyone is interested.
补充补充资料：美国 EPA 的辐射监测网络
EPA 有一个展示美国辐射传感器监测网络的网站：https://www.epa.gov/radnet。希望你永远用不上这个信息。
fdavison查看英文原文
The EPA has a website that displays a network of radiation sensors in the US: https://www.epa.gov/radnet Hope you never need that information.
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