Optical seals record nuclear tampering.Optical seals record nuclear tampering tampering The adulteration of a thing. See Drug tampering. The International Atomic Energy Agency International Atomic Energy Agency: see Atomic Energy Agency, International. International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) International organization officially founded in 1957 to promote the peaceful use of nuclear energy. (IAEA IAEA International Atomic Energy Agency. ) has begun field tests of a fiber-optic seal for use at nuclear facilities and on equipment the agency inspects. This seal permits on-the-spot identification of tampering--a capability not previously available to inspectors of the Vienna, Austria-based agency. One of IAEA's major responsibilities is detection of efforts to steal nuclear material for use in weapons. The new seals, developed jointly by Sandia National Laboratories Sandia National Laboratories, which is managed and operated by the Sandia Corporation (a wholly owned subsidiary of Lockheed Martin Corporation), is a major United States Department of Energy research and development national laboratory with two locations, one in Albuquerque, New in Albuquerque, N.M., and the Alexandria, Va.-based Atlantic Research Corp., would replace the metal-and-wire seals IAEA now uses, which are removed for analysis of tampering, then discarded. Because the new seals can be analyzed in place, they should last indefinitely, says Dennis Mangan, Sandia's international safeguards supervisor. To picture how the seals work, imagine the type of shackle shackle a bar 2.5 ft long with an iron loop at either end, used in restraint of large pigs. A chain is threaded through the loops and around the lower hindlimbs of the pig. When the chain is pulled the pig is stretched and is cast with the limbs held wide apart. lock used to secure a gym locker. The U-shaped arm that would be passed through the locker door is, in this device, a tiny cable containing 64 randomly twisted optical fibers. After being fed through openings on the device that will be secured, the cable's two free ends are threaded through holes in a plastic housing. Insertion of a serrated serrated /ser·rat·ed/ (ser´at-ed) having a sawlike edge. serrated (ser´āted), adj having a jagged or notched edge; saw-toothed. horseshoe-shaped blade through a slit in the housing's body manacles man·a·cle n. 1. A device for confining the hands, usually consisting of a set of two metal rings that are fastened about the wrists and joined by a metal chain. 2. Something that confines or restrains. tr.v. the cable ends in place. In securing the cable, some of the blade's teeth will sever 40 to 60 percent of the optical fibers, making them unable to transmit light. Later, when light is shined into one cable end, a pattern of lighted dots will appear at the other end, identifying intact fibers. This pattern, the cable's signature, is unique to each secured seal. The seal's sensitivity to tampering comes from the special blade used to secure the cable. Its teeth are angled in several directions. Upon entering the cable, only some cutting teeth are active. Others slide harmlessly through optical fibers in the downstroke, but actively cut additional fibers if an attempt is made to withdraw the blade. IAEA inspectors would periodically query each seal with a device that shines light into one end of a seal's cable and takes a Polaroid snapshot of the signature emitted by the other end. It would be compared against the seal's initial signature. Photo: Signature of a new seal (left) was altered (right) by tampering. |
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