Comment by philipkglass
1 month ago
According to the Luciteria listing linked by other commenters, this was a microscopic sample of plutonium, as plutonium oxide, enclosed as part of an old Soviet smoke detector. It's like the radioactive americium source used in modern smoke detectors but made with an element one atomic number lower.
A plutonium bomb core requires a mass of several kilograms. This sample was 35 nanograms, or about 11 orders of magnitude away from being a nuclear weapons proliferation risk. The authorities might as well accuse someone of running a biological warfare program for having bacteria on their house's doorknobs.
In addition to the minute quantity, this analysis of a Soviet smoke detector source shows that the plutonium was mixed isotopes, containing only about 73% Pu-239:
https://carlwillis.wordpress.com/2017/02/07/analysis-of-sovi...
It is not weapons grade plutonium, though it is higher in Pu-239 than plutonium from modern spent reactor fuel.
> Luciteria listing
Did they buy it from Luciteria? This article doesn't say.
All an evil doer has to do then is order a veritable mountain of samples and lump them all together once he has enough.
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