MIT-OCW: 22.01 Introduction to Nuclear Engineering and Ionizing Radiation, Fall 2016

A brief summary of the discovery of forms of ionizing radiation up to the 1932 discovery of the neutron. We introduce mass-energy equivalence for the first time and explain how these cutting-edge experiments (for their time) conclusively proved the existence of high-energy, ionizing radiation.

A survey of the different types of technologies which use ionizing radiation, including for energy, medicine, safety, resource exploration, and diagnostics. We briefly preview the physical principles behind each one, setting the stage for the next three months of detailed fundamentals.

Today we formally introduce the concept that mass is energy, by exploring trends in nuclear stability. We introduce the notation we’ll use to describe nuclei and their reactions throughout the rest of the course, and introduce nuclear binding energy, analogous to chemical binding energy. We also introduce cross sections, or per-particle nuclear reaction probabilities, showing how a simple, first-order differential equation can result in their definition.