This document details activities at the Hanford Works during the month of August 1948. (JL)

This report outlines plans for tests of the graphite stack during lay up in the pile structures. Measurements are planned upon completion of layers 20, 60, and 102, which will require not more than 16 hours each. The test method will require restriction of Construction personnel from the areas immediately adjacent to the pile. Precise boundaries will be set up in collaboration with H I Division personnel prior to the test.

This paper describes a high voltage pulse generator developed to deflect the beam of the 184-inch cyclotron at Berkeley, California. The apparatus develops a deflecting potential of 200 kilovolts that rises from 10% to 90% of peak value in 0.1 microseconds. The unit employs two similar 100 kilovolt water cooled pulse transformers connected symmetrically about ground to the electric deflector bars. Water-cooled General Electric pulse capacitors are discharged through the two turn primary windings of the pulse transformers by triggering a battery of 16 paralleled Kuthe 5022 hydrogen thyratrons. Output voltages are developed across the 17 turn secondary winding of the pulse transformer. The transformer is mounted in an oil filled lucite case that provides both insulation and compact design.

A scheme of glucose degradation has been validated by the use of intermediates of known isotopic composition. In this scheme: glucose {yields} lactic acid {yields} CO{sub 2} (C-3,4) + acetic acid {yields} CO{sub 2} (C-2,5) + acetone {yields} iodoform (C-1,6) + acetate (C-1,6; 2,5), it was found that (a) in the oxidation of lactic acid, approximately 4.7% of the acetic acid was oxidized to CO{sub 2}; and (b) under the conditions prescribed, BaCO{sub 3} from the degradation of Ba acetate contained approximately 1.5% of the activity of the methyl group.

The availability of separated isotopes of Mg makes it easy to determine the half life of Al{sup 26}, a member of the Wigner series which has long been suspected to have a half life of approximately 7 seconds, but which has not been confirmed because of the masking 7 second activity of Al{sup 26}. Mg{sup 24}, Mg{sup 25} and Mg{sup 26} (in the form of MgO) have been bombarded with protons from the Berkeley Linear Accelerator, with the following results: (1) Mg{sup 24} yields an activity of approximately 23 seconds half life, presumably due to Na{sup 21} from the reaction Mg{sup 24}(p,a)Na{sup 21}; (2) the Mg{sup 25} yields an activity of approximately 8 seconds half life, which they assign to the reaction Mg{sup 25}(p,n)Al{sup 25}; and (3) The Mg{sup 26} yields an activity of approximately 6 seconds half life, assigned to Al{sup 26} according to a similar reaction. It seems probable therefore that the 7 seconds half life normally given for Al{sup 26} is a mixture of these two activities.

This quarterly progress report describes four programs namely (1) The Metabolic Properties of Plutonium and Allied Materials (2) Biological studies of radiation effects, (3) Biological effects of radiation from external and internal sources, and (4) Health Physics and Chemistry. Progress for each program has been separately indexed and abstracted for the database.

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Neutron shielding is done to protect workers from excessive radiation and to keep a low neutron background for research in neutron counting. To meet health standards the total neutron flux allowable is 150 n/cm/sec per eight hours, or 50 n/cm/sec per twenty-four hours. Literature values for the absorption coefficients of paraffin and water are considered, and some experimental data is presented which approximately confirm them. A description of barriers at Mound Laboratory is given. Plans for future work on slowing-down of fast nautrons and capture of slow neutrons are included.