The U.S. Department of Homeland Security’s (DHS) Domestic Nuclear Detection Office (DNDO), in conjunction with researchers at the Pacific Northwest National Laboratory (PNNL), recently launched a new capability that improves the department’s ability to trace the origins of plutonium.
The program, titled the Plutonium Processing Signatures Discovery capability, will assist the department in nuclear forensics investigations. Such investigations typically involve identifying from where illicit radioactive materials are sourced to allow investigators to determine who is ultimately responsible for a potential attack.
DNDO Acting Director L. Wayne Brasure said in a statement that the varied processes produced slightly different characteristics, such as material color and density. Those unique characteristics, Brasure said, were referred to as nuclear forensic signatures and that the department’s new capability would significantly improve their ability to trace the origins of plutonium as it allows DHS to replicate individual nation’s processes.
“This not only helps us identify where the radioactive material came from, but also allows us to predict forensic signatures of plutonium from a given process without having actual samples of those materials,” Brasure said.
PNNL Director Steven Ashby said the capability took four years to develop and was the result of partnerships from PNNL, DNDO, and the nuclear forensics community.