Re: Nuclear Batteries

[makay@reed.edu (Michael A Kay)]

Some of the work on isotopic power sources such as SNAP (Systems for Nuclear
Auxillary Power) was conducted at the US Naval Radiological Defense Lab
at Hunters Point in San Francisco. Strontium Titanate was developed there as
a stable heat source that is insoluble in fresh and salt water and body
fluids. It was used in several items for remote or undersea sensing.

The USNRDL was decommissioned around 1968, and I do not know where the
records of research are available, or even if some of them have yet
been declassified. The devices developed were in Hunt For Red October.
If you have access to a government documents depository library, microfilms
might have some of the USNRDL-TR series of reports.

Additional work was conducted at Sanders Nuclear, a subsidiary of Sanders
Associates of Nashua, New Hampshire and Cambridge Nuclear Corporation.
There was work done on Thulium-170 and Thulium-171 isotopic powered thermo-
electric converters. I worked on the development of a method for the production
of Tm-171 using a double Szilard-Chalmers reaction; patented and assigned to
Sanders Nuclear. I have no idea where any of the records from that work are
kept today, or even if they are still available at all.

Good luck in your search.

Michael A. Kay, ScD, CHMM
makay@reed.edu