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100-482: The project was intended as a prototype and demonstration for building a class of such reactors, called Liquid Metal Fast Breeder Reactors (LMFBR), in the United States . The project was first authorized in 1970. After initial appropriations were provided in 1972, work continued until the U.S. Congress terminated funding on October 26, 1983. The project was seen to be "unnecessary and wasteful". The site for

200-639: A mockup , which is an inert representation of a machine's appearance, often made of some non-durable substance. An electronics designer often builds the first prototype from breadboard or stripboard or perfboard , typically using "DIP" packages. However, more and more often the first functional prototype is built on a "prototype PCB " almost identical to the production PCB, as PCB manufacturing prices fall and as many components are not available in DIP packages, but only available in SMT packages optimized for placing on

300-539: A second (thus defining the speed of light to be 299,792,458 meters per second). In many sciences, from pathology to taxonomy, prototype refers to a disease, species, etc. which sets a good example for the whole category. In biology, prototype is the ancestral or primitive form of a species or other group; an archetype. For example, the Senegal bichir is regarded as the prototypes of its genus, Polypterus . Nuclear proliferation Nuclear proliferation

400-483: A German nuclear program. These efforts began immediately after the discovery of nuclear fission and its military potential. None of these efforts were explicitly public, because the weapon developments themselves were kept secret until the bombing of Hiroshima . Earnest international efforts to promote nuclear non-proliferation began soon after World War II , when the Truman Administration proposed

500-425: A PCB. Builders of military machines and aviation prefer the terms "experimental" and "service test". In electronics , prototyping means building an actual circuit to a theoretical design to verify that it works, and to provide a physical platform for debugging it if it does not. The prototype is often constructed using techniques such as wire wrapping or using a breadboard , stripboard or perfboard , with

600-529: A favorite among US Military modelers), railroad equipment, motor trucks, motorcycles, and space-ships (real-world such as Apollo/Saturn Vs, or the ISS). As of 2014, basic rapid prototype machines (such as 3D printers ) cost about $ 2,000, but larger and more precise machines can cost as much as $ 500,000. In architecture , prototyping refers to either architectural model making (as form of scale modelling ) or as part of aesthetic or material experimentation , such as

700-463: A gross output of 380 MW. The reactor core was designed to contain 198 hexagonal fuel assemblies, arranged to form a cylindrical geometry with two enrichment zones. The inner core would have contained 18% plutonium and would have consisted of 108 assemblies. It would have been surrounded by the outer zone, which would have consisted of 90 assemblies of 24% plutonium to promote more uniform heat generation. The active fuel would have been surrounded by

800-482: A military defeat assisted this process. In North Korea, the activities concerned took place before the conclusion of its NPT safeguards agreement. With North Korea, the promised provision of commercial power reactors appeared to resolve the situation for a time, but it later withdrew from the NPT and declared it had nuclear weapons. In 1993 a program was initiated to strengthen and extend the classical safeguards system, and

900-620: A model protocol was agreed by the IAEA Board of Governors 1997. The measures boosted the IAEA's ability to detect undeclared nuclear activities, including those with no connection to the civil fuel cycle. Innovations were of two kinds. Some could be implemented on the basis of IAEA's existing legal authority through safeguards agreements and inspections. Others required further legal authority to be conferred through an Additional Protocol . This must be agreed by each non-weapons state with IAEA, as

1000-408: A nuclear fuel. India has 14 small nuclear power reactors in commercial operation, two larger ones under construction, and ten more planned. The 14 operating ones (2548 MWe total) comprise: The two under construction and two of the planned ones are 450 MWe versions of these 200 MWe domestic products. Construction has been seriously delayed by financial and technical problems. In 2001 a final agreement

1100-526: A nuclear power program have a dual-use capability, in that several stages of the nuclear fuel cycle allow diversion of nuclear materials for nuclear weapons. When this happens a nuclear power program can become a route leading to the atomic bomb or a public annex to a secret bomb program. The crisis over Iran's nuclear activities is a case in point. Many UN and US agencies warn that building more nuclear reactors unavoidably increases nuclear proliferation risks. A fundamental goal for American and global security

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1200-401: A party to the NPT, although North Korea acceded to the NPT in 1985, then withdrew in 2003 and conducted its first nuclear test in 2006. One critique of the NPT is that the treaty is discriminatory in the sense that only those countries that tested nuclear weapons before 1968 are recognized as nuclear weapon states while all other states are treated as non-nuclear-weapon states who can only join

1300-608: A radial blanket consisting of 150 assemblies of similar, but not identical, design containing depleted uranium oxide; outside of the blanket would have been 324 radial shield assemblies of the same overall hexagonal geometry. The primary (green) and secondary (gold) control rod systems would have provided overall plant shutdown reliability. Each system would have contained boron carbide . The secondary rods were to be used only for SCRAM , and would have been required to be fully withdrawn before startup could be initiated. A significant number of major reactor components were procured for

1400-558: A safeguards system as specified under Article III of the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT) of 1968, which aims to ensure that civil stocks of uranium and plutonium, as well as facilities and technologies associated with these nuclear materials, are used only for peaceful purposes and do not contribute in any way to proliferation or nuclear weapons programs. It is often argued that the proliferation of nuclear weapons to many other states has been prevented by

1500-574: A second series of nuclear tests in 1998, Pakistan followed with a series of tests of its own. In 2006, North Korea conducted its first nuclear test . Early efforts to prevent nuclear proliferation involved intense government secrecy, the wartime acquisition of known uranium stores (the Combined Development Trust ), and at times even outright sabotage —such as the bombing of a heavy-water facility in Norway thought to be used for

1600-594: A set of export rules, to the IAEA in 1978. These were to ensure that transfers of nuclear material or equipment would not be diverted to unsafeguarded nuclear fuel cycle or nuclear explosive activities, and formal government assurances to this effect were required from recipients. The Guidelines also recognised the need for physical protection measures in the transfer of sensitive facilities, technology and weapons-usable materials, and strengthened retransfer provisions. The group began with seven members—the United States,

1700-413: A statement explaining his veto of a bill to authorize funding for the continuation of the project, Carter said it would be "large and unnecessarily expensive" and "when completed, would be technically obsolete and economically unsound." Furthermore, he said the project would have little value for determining the commercial viability of breeder technology in the United States. Congress persisted in keeping

1800-774: A supplement to any existing comprehensive safeguards agreement. Weapons states have agreed to accept the principles of the model additional protocol. Key elements of the model Additional Protocol: As of 3 July 2015, 146 countries have signed the Additional Protocols and 126 have brought them into force. The IAEA is also applying the measures of the Additional Protocol in Taiwan. Under the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action , Iran has agreed to implement its protocol provisionally. Among

1900-499: A time to the initial prototype. In many programming languages , a function prototype is the declaration of a subroutine or function (and should not be confused with software prototyping). This term is rather C / C++ -specific; other terms for this notion are signature , type and interface . In prototype-based programming (a form of object-oriented programming ), new objects are produced by cloning existing objects, which are called prototypes. The term may also refer to

2000-472: A way that the Planck constant h is prescribed a value of exactly 6.626 070 15 × 10  joule-second (J⋅s) Until 1960, the meter was defined by a platinum-iridium prototype bar with two marks on it (that were, by definition, spaced apart by one meter), the international prototype of the metre , and in 1983 the meter was redefined to be the distance in free space covered by light in 1/299,792,458 of

2100-518: Is a form of functional or working prototype. The justification for its creation is usually a data migration , data integration or application implementation project and the raw materials used as input are an instance of all the relevant data which exists at the start of the project. The objectives of data prototyping are to produce: To achieve this, a data architect uses a graphical interface to interactively develop and execute transformation and cleansing rules using raw data. The resultant data

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2200-497: Is a potential nuclear arms stockpile replacement since the isotope naturally decays . In May 1995, NPT parties reaffirmed their commitment to a Fissile Materials Cut-off Treaty to prohibit the production of any further fissile material for weapons. This aims to complement the Comprehensive Nuclear-Test-Ban Treaty of 1996 (not entered into force as of June 2020) and to codify commitments made by

2300-509: Is a prime cause of bilateral tension, its sovereignty being in dispute since 1948 . There is a persistent low-level bilateral military conflict due to the alleged backing of insurgency by Pakistan in India, and the infiltration of Pakistani state-backed militants into the Indian state of Jammu and Kashmir , along with the disputed status of Kashmir . Both engaged in a conventional arms race in

2400-517: Is becoming practical to eliminate the creation of a physical prototype (except possibly at greatly reduced scales for promotional purposes), instead modeling all aspects of the final product as a computer model . An example of such a development can be seen in Boeing 787 Dreamliner , in which the first full sized physical realization is made on the series production line. Computer modeling is now being extensively used in automotive design, both for form (in

2500-421: Is generally used to evaluate a new design to enhance precision by system analysts and users. Prototyping serves to provide specifications for a real, working system rather than a theoretical one. Physical prototyping has a long history, and paper prototyping and virtual prototyping now extensively complement it. In some design workflow models, creating a prototype (a process sometimes called materialization )

2600-430: Is not accurate. Both Canada (by supplying the 40 MW research reactor) and the United States (by supplying 21 tons of heavy water) supplied India with the technology necessary to create a nuclear weapons program, dubbed CIRUS (Canada-India Reactor, United States). Canada sold India the reactor on the condition that the reactor and any by-products would be "employed for peaceful purposes only." Archived 27 September 2007 at

2700-427: Is not classified as a "special nuclear material" but rather as a by-product. It is seen as an important litmus test on the seriousness of the United States' intention to nuclear disarm . This radioactive, super-heavy, hydrogen isotope is used to boost the efficiency of fissile materials in nuclear weapons. The United States resumed tritium production in 2003 for the first time in 15 years. This could indicate that there

2800-431: Is possible that a prototype may fail to perform acceptably although the production design may have been sound. Conversely, prototypes may perform acceptably but the production design and outcome may prove unsuccessful. In general, it can be expected that individual prototype costs will be substantially greater than the final production costs due to inefficiencies in materials and processes. Prototypes are also used to revise

2900-438: Is the growth and modernization of China's nuclear arsenal and its assistance with Pakistan's nuclear power programme and, reportedly, with missile technology, which exacerbate Indian concerns. In particular, as viewed by Indian strategists, Pakistan is aided by China's People's Liberation Army . Nuclear power for civil use is well established in India . Its civil nuclear strategy has been directed towards complete independence in

3000-642: Is the spread of nuclear weapons , fissionable material, and weapons-applicable nuclear technology and information to nations not recognized as " Nuclear Weapon States " by the Treaty on the Non-Proliferation of Nuclear Weapons , commonly known as the Non-Proliferation Treaty or NPT . Proliferation has been opposed by many nations with and without nuclear weapons, as governments fear that more countries with nuclear weapons will increase

3100-405: Is the step between the formalization and the evaluation of an idea. A prototype can also mean a typical example of something such as in the use of the derivation ' prototypical '. This is a useful term in identifying objects, behaviours and concepts which are considered the accepted norm and is analogous with terms such as stereotypes and archetypes . The word prototype derives from

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3200-414: Is then evaluated and the rules refined. Beyond the obvious visual checking of the data on-screen by the data architect, the usual evaluation and validation approaches are to use Data profiling software and then to insert the resultant data into a test version of the target application and trial its use. When developing software or digital tools that humans interact with, a prototype is an artifact that

3300-587: Is to minimize the proliferation risks associated with the expansion of nuclear power. If this development is "poorly managed or efforts to contain risks are unsuccessful, the nuclear future will be dangerous". For nuclear power programs to be developed and managed safely and securely, it is important that countries have domestic “ good governance ” characteristics that will encourage proper nuclear operations and management: These characteristics include low degrees of corruption (to avoid officials selling materials and technology for their own personal gain as occurred with

3400-499: Is used as the standard of measurement of some physical quantity to base all measurement of that physical quantity against. Sometimes this standard object is called an artifact . In the International System of Units ( SI ), there remains no prototype standard since May 20, 2019 . Before that date, the last prototype used was the international prototype of the kilogram , a solid platinum-iridium cylinder kept at

3500-409: Is used to ask and answer a design question. Prototypes provide the means for examining design problems and evaluating solutions. HCI practitioners can employ several different types of prototypes: In the field of scale modeling (which includes model railroading , vehicle modeling, airplane modeling , military modeling, etc.), a prototype is the real-world basis or source for a scale model—such as

3600-566: The A.Q. Khan smuggling network in Pakistan), high degrees of political stability (defined by the World Bank as "likelihood that the government will be destabilized or overthrown by unconstitutional or violent means, including politically-motivated violence and terrorism"), high governmental effectiveness scores (a World Bank aggregate measure of "the quality of the civil service and the degree of its independence from political pressures [and]

3700-679: The Baruch Plan of 1946, named after Bernard Baruch , America's first representative to the United Nations Atomic Energy Commission (UNAEC). The Baruch Plan , which drew heavily from the Acheson–Lilienthal Report of 1946, proposed the verifiable dismantlement and destruction of the U.S. nuclear arsenal (which, at that time, was the only nuclear arsenal in the world) after all governments had cooperated successfully to accomplish two things: (1)

3800-594: The Bureau International des Poids et Mesures (International Bureau of Weights and Measures) in Sèvres France (a suburb of Paris ) that by definition was the mass of exactly one kilogram . Copies of this prototype are fashioned and issued to many nations to represent the national standard of the kilogram and are periodically compared to the Paris prototype. Now the kilogram is redefined in such

3900-727: The Eighteen Nation Disarmament Committee (ENDC) finished negotiations on the text of the NPT. In June 1968, the U.N. General Assembly endorsed the NPT with General Assembly Resolution 2373 (XXII), and in July 1968, the NPT opened for signature in Washington, D.C. , London and Moscow . The NPT entered into force in March 1970. Since the mid-1970s, the primary focus of non-proliferation efforts has been to maintain, and even increase, international control over

4000-497: The European Commission . Its goal is to "[..] provide competitive, commercially-based services as an alternative to a state’s development of costly, proliferation-sensitive facilities, and address other issues associated with the safe and secure management of used fuel and radioactive waste ." According to Kenneth D. Bergeron's Tritium on Ice: The Dangerous New Alliance of Nuclear Weapons and Nuclear Power , tritium

4100-528: The Forty Wall House open source material prototyping centre in Australia. Architects prototype to test ideas structurally, aesthetically and technically. Whether the prototype works or not is not the primary focus: architectural prototyping is the revelatory process through which the architect gains insight. In the science and practice of metrology , a prototype is a human-made object that

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4200-589: The Greek πρωτότυπον prototypon , "primitive form", neutral of πρωτότυπος prototypos , "original, primitive", from πρῶτος protos , "first" and τύπος typos , "impression" (originally in the sense of a mark left by a blow, then by a stamp struck by a die (note "typewriter"); by implication a scar or mark; by analogy a shape i.e. a statue, (figuratively) style, or resemblance; a model for imitation or illustrative example—note "typical"). Prototypes explore different aspects of an intended design: In general,

4300-524: The People's Republic of China , an acknowledged nuclear weapons state. Both countries are opposed to the NPT as it stands, and India has consistently attacked the Treaty since its inception in 1970 labeling it as a lopsided treaty in favor of the nuclear powers. Relations between the two countries are tense and hostile, and the risks of nuclear conflict between them have long been considered quite high. Kashmir

4400-536: The Prototype Javascript Framework . Additionally, the term may refer to the prototype design pattern. Continuous learning approaches within organizations or businesses may also use the concept of business or process prototypes through software models. The concept of prototypicality is used to describe how much a website deviates from the expected norm, and leads to a lowering of user preference for that site's design. A data prototype

4500-503: The U.N. General Assembly . Eisenhower's proposal led eventually to the creation of the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) in 1957. Under the "Atoms for Peace" program thousands of scientists from around the world were educated in nuclear science and then dispatched home, where many later pursued secret weapons programs in their home country. Efforts to conclude an international agreement to limit

4600-512: The UK , and the United States . Notable non-signatories to the NPT are Israel, Pakistan, and India (the latter two have since tested nuclear weapons, while Israel is considered by most to be an unacknowledged nuclear weapons state). North Korea was once a signatory but withdrew in January 2003. The legality of North Korea's withdrawal is debatable but as of 9 October 2006, North Korea clearly possesses

4700-660: The Wayback Machine . Similarly, the United States sold India heavy water for use in the reactor "only... in connection with research into and the use of atomic energy for peaceful purposes" Archived 27 September 2007 at the Wayback Machine . India, in violation of these agreements, used the Canadian-supplied reactor and American-supplied heavy water to produce plutonium for their first nuclear explosion, Smiling Buddha . The Indian government controversially justified this, however, by claiming that Smiling Buddha

4800-491: The fissile material and specialized technologies necessary to build such devices because these are the most difficult and expensive parts of a nuclear weapons program. The main materials whose generation and distribution are controlled are highly enriched uranium and plutonium . Other than the acquisition of these special materials, the scientific and technical means for weapons construction to develop rudimentary, but working, nuclear explosive devices are considered to be within

4900-431: The southern part of the country . At the moment, India has a small fast breeder reactor and is planning a much larger one ( Prototype Fast Breeder Reactor ). This self-sufficiency extends from uranium exploration and mining through fuel fabrication, heavy water production, reactor design and construction, to reprocessing and waste management. It is also developing technology to utilise its abundant resources of thorium as

5000-421: The styling and aerodynamics of the vehicle) and in function—especially for improving vehicle crashworthiness and in weight reduction to improve mileage. The most common use of the word prototype is a functional, although experimental, version of a non-military machine (e.g., automobiles, domestic appliances, consumer electronics) whose designers would like to have built by mass production means, as opposed to

5100-410: The 1980s, including sophisticated technology and equipment capable of delivering nuclear weapons. In the 1990s the arms race quickened. In 1994 India reversed a four-year trend of reduced allocations for defence, and despite its much smaller economy, Pakistan was expected to push its own expenditures yet higher. Both have lost their patrons: India, the former USSR, and Pakistan, the United States. But it

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5200-488: The CRBRP. By 1981, the following components were 100% complete: Heat exchanger, control rods, sodium pumps were also built and in testing. The Clinch River Breeder Reactor was initially conceived as a major step toward developing liquid-metal fast breeder reactor technology as a commercially viable electric power generation system in the United States. In 1971 U.S. President Richard Nixon established this technology as

5300-769: The Clinch River Breeder Reactor was a 1,364-acre (6 km) land parcel owned by the TVA adjacent to the Clinch River in Roane County, Tennessee , inside the city limits of Oak Ridge, Tennessee , but remote from the city's residential population. The site is now known as the Clinch River Nuclear Site . The reactor would have been rated at 1000 megawatts (MW) of thermal output, with a net plant output of 350 MW (electrical) and

5400-608: The Clinch River project alive over the President's objections, and Carter repeatedly chastised Congress for its actions. In a speech in 1979, after the House Science and Technology Committee had voted to proceed with the project over his opposition, he said "The Clinch River breeder reactor is a technological dinosaur. It's a waste of more than $ 1-1/2 billion of taxpayers' money. It's an assault on our attempts to control

5500-565: The IAEA reports to both the United Nations General Assembly and the Security Council . The IAEA regularly inspects civil nuclear facilities to verify the accuracy of documentation supplied to it. The agency checks inventories, and samples and analyzes materials. Safeguards are designed to deter a diversion of nuclear material by increasing the risk of early detection. They are complemented by controls on

5600-565: The NPT and which have significant unsafeguarded nuclear activities; India, Pakistan, and Israel fall within this category. While safeguards apply to some of their activities, others remain beyond scrutiny. A further concern is that countries may develop various sensitive nuclear fuel cycle facilities and research reactors under full safeguards and then subsequently opt out of the NPT. Bilateral agreements, such as insisted upon by Australia and Canada for sale of uranium , address this by including fallback provisions, but many countries are outside

5700-452: The NPT regime lay in the fact that no obvious diversion of material was involved. The uranium used as fuel probably came from indigenous sources, and the nuclear facilities were built by the countries themselves without being declared or placed under safeguards. Iraq, as an NPT party, was obliged to declare all facilities but did not do so. Nevertheless, the activities were detected and brought under control using international diplomacy. In Iraq,

5800-406: The NPT, and a 100 MW indigenous unit in operation since 1985. Both use local uranium, as India does not import any nuclear fuel. It is estimated that India may have built up enough weapons-grade plutonium for a hundred nuclear warheads. It is widely believed that the nuclear programs of India and Pakistan used Canadian CANDU reactors to produce fissionable materials for their weapons; however, this

5900-450: The United States, the UK, France and Russia to cease production of weapons material, as well as putting a similar ban on China. This treaty will also put more pressure on Israel, India and Pakistan to agree to international verification. On 9 August 2005, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei issued a fatwa forbidding the production, stockpiling and use of nuclear weapons . Khamenei's official statement

6000-406: The capability to make a nuclear explosive device. The IAEA was established on 29 July 1957 to help nations develop nuclear energy for peaceful purposes. Allied to this role is the administration of safeguards arrangements to provide assurance to the international community that individual countries are honoring their commitments under the treaty. Though established under its own international treaty,

6100-464: The commercial breeder reactor program, because this technology produces plutonium that potentially could be used to make nuclear weapons . Because of international concern about proliferation, in April 1977 President Jimmy Carter called for an indefinite deferral of construction of commercial breeder reactors. President Carter was a consistent opponent of the Clinch River project. In November 1977, in

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6200-464: The correctness of formal declarations by suspect states, in the 1990s attention turned to what might not have been declared. While accepting safeguards at declared facilities, Iraq had set up elaborate equipment elsewhere in an attempt to enrich uranium to weapons-grade. North Korea attempted to use research reactors (not commercial electricity-generating reactors) and a nuclear reprocessing plant to produce some weapons-grade plutonium . The weakness of

6300-404: The creation of prototypes will differ from creation of the final product in some fundamental ways: Engineers and prototype specialists attempt to minimize the impact of these differences on the intended role for the prototype. For example, if a visual prototype is not able to use the same materials as the final product, they will attempt to substitute materials with properties that closely simulate

6400-407: The cycle returns to customer evaluation. The cycle starts by listening to the user, followed by building or revising a mock-up, and letting the user test the mock-up , then back. There is now a new generation of tools called Application Simulation Software which help quickly simulate application before their development. Extreme programming uses iterative design to gradually add one feature at

6500-403: The design for the purposes of reducing costs through optimization and refinement. It is possible to use prototype testing to reduce the risk that a design may not perform as intended, however prototypes generally cannot eliminate all risk. Building the full design is often expensive and can be time-consuming, especially when repeated several times—building the full design, figuring out what

6600-461: The destruction of nuclear weapons invoked basic moral and religious intuitions. In one part of his address to the UN, Baruch said, "Behind the black portent of the new atomic age lies a hope which, seized upon with faith, can work out our salvation. If we fail, then we have damned every man to be the slave of Fear. Let us not deceive ourselves. We must elect World Peace or World Destruction.... We must answer

6700-426: The establishment of an "international atomic development authority," which would actually own and control all military-applicable nuclear materials and activities, and (2) the creation of a system of automatic sanctions, which not even the U.N. Security Council could veto, and which would proportionately punish states attempting to acquire the capability to make nuclear weapons or fissile material . Baruch's plea for

6800-541: The export of sensitive technology from countries such as the UK and the United States through voluntary bodies such as the Nuclear Suppliers Group . The main concern of the IAEA is that uranium not be enriched beyond what is necessary for commercial civil plants, and that plutonium which is produced by nuclear reactors not be refined into a form that would be suitable for bomb production. Traditional safeguards are arrangements to account for and control

6900-409: The extension of assurances and mutual defence treaties to these states by nuclear powers, but other factors, such as national prestige, or specific historical experiences, also play a part in hastening or stopping nuclear proliferation. Dual-use technology refers to the possibility of military use of civilian nuclear power technology. Many technologies and materials associated with the creation of

7000-644: The former USSR, the United Kingdom, France, Germany, Canada and Japan—but now includes 46 countries including all five nuclear weapons states . The International Framework for Nuclear Energy Cooperation is an international project involving 25 partner countries, 28 observer and candidate partner countries, and the International Atomic Energy Agency, the Generation IV International Forum, and

7100-508: The full design. In technology research, a technology demonstrator is a prototype serving as proof-of-concept and demonstration model for a new technology or future product, proving its viability and illustrating conceivable applications. In large development projects, a testbed is a platform and prototype development environment for rigorous experimentation and testing of new technologies, components, scientific theories and computational tools. With recent advances in computer modeling it

7200-457: The government, ground was broken and construction began. The project was finally terminated when, on October 26, 1983, the U.S. Senate voted 56-40 to deny any further financing for the project. Prototype A prototype is an early sample, model, or release of a product built to test a concept or process. It is a term used in a variety of contexts, including semantics , design , electronics , and software programming . A prototype

7300-437: The intended final materials. Engineers and prototyping specialists seek to understand the limitations of prototypes to exactly simulate the characteristics of their intended design. Prototypes represent some compromise from the final production design. This is due to the skill and choices of the designer(s), and the inevitable inherent limitations of a prototype. Due to differences in materials, processes and design fidelity, it

7400-477: The international non-proliferation regime. They possess or are quickly capable of assembling one or more nuclear weapons. They have remained outside the 1970 NPT. They are thus largely excluded from trade in nuclear plants or materials, except for safety-related devices for a few safeguarded facilities. In May 1998 India and Pakistan each exploded several nuclear devices underground. This heightened concerns regarding an arms race between them, with Pakistan involving

7500-410: The leading countries that have not signed the Additional Protocol are Egypt, which says it will not sign until Israel accepts comprehensive IAEA safeguards, and Brazil, which opposes making the protocol a requirement for international cooperation on enrichment and reprocessing, but has not ruled out signing. The greatest risk from nuclear weapons proliferation comes from countries that have not joined

7600-531: The majority of the project cost ($ 257 million). By the following year, however, projected costs had jumped to nearly $ 700 million. By 1981 $ 1 billion of public money had been spent on the project, and the estimated cost to completion had grown to $ 3.0-$ 3.2 billion, with another billion dollars needed for an associated spent nuclear fuel reprocessing facility. A Congressional committee investigation released in 1981 found evidence of contracting abuse, including bribery and fraud , that added to project costs. Before it

7700-497: The nation’s highest priority research and development effort. However, the Clinch River project was controversial from the start, and economic and political considerations eventually led to its demise. One issue was the continuing escalation in the cost of the project. In 1971 the Atomic Energy Commission estimated that the Clinch River project would cost about $ 400 million. Private industry promised to contribute

7800-512: The non-NPT states (India, Pakistan and Israel), facility-specific safeguards apply. IAEA inspectors regularly visit these facilities to verify completeness and accuracy of records. The terms of the NPT cannot be enforced by the IAEA itself, nor can nations be forced to sign the treaty. In reality, as shown in Iraq and North Korea , safeguards can be backed up by diplomatic, political and economic measures. While traditional safeguards easily verified

7900-452: The nuclear fuel cycle, necessary because of its outspoken rejection of the NPT. Due to economic and technological isolation of India after the nuclear tests in 1974, India has largely diverted focus on developing and perfecting the fast breeder technology by intensive materials and fuel cycle research at the dedicated center established for research into fast reactor technology, Indira Gandhi Center for Atomic Research (IGCAR) at Kalpakkam , in

8000-401: The nuclear material being audited. Inspections by the IAEA are complemented by other measures such as surveillance cameras and instrumentation. The inspections act as an alert system providing a warning of the possible diversion of nuclear material from peaceful activities. The system relies on; All NPT non-weapons states must accept these full-scope safeguards. In the five weapons states plus

8100-450: The possibility of nuclear warfare (up to and including the so-called countervalue targeting of civilians with nuclear weapons), de-stabilize international or regional relations, or infringe upon the national sovereignty of nation states . Four countries besides the five recognized Nuclear Weapon States have acquired, or are presumed to have acquired, nuclear weapons: India , Pakistan , North Korea , and Israel . None of these four are

8200-429: The problems are and how to solve them, then building another full design. As an alternative, rapid prototyping or rapid application development techniques are used for the initial prototypes, which implement part, but not all, of the complete design. This allows designers and manufacturers to rapidly and inexpensively test the parts of the design that are most likely to have problems, solve those problems, and then build

8300-411: The prototyping platform, or replace it with only the microcontroller chip and the circuitry that is relevant to their product. Prototype software is often referred to as alpha grade , meaning it is the first version to run. Often only a few functions are implemented, the primary focus of the alpha is to have a functional base code on to which features may be added. Once alpha grade software has most of

8400-622: The quality of policy formulation and implementation"), and a strong degree of regulatory competence. At present, 189 countries are States Parties to the Treaty on the Nonproliferation of Nuclear Weapons , more commonly known as the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty or NPT. These include the five Nuclear Weapons States (NWS) recognized by the NPT: the People's Republic of China , France , Russian Federation ,

8500-605: The reach of industrialized nations. Since its founding by the United Nations in 1957, the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) has promoted two, sometimes contradictory, missions: on the one hand, the Agency seeks to promote and spread internationally the use of civilian nuclear energy; on the other hand, it seeks to prevent, or at least detect, the diversion of civilian nuclear energy to nuclear weapons, nuclear explosive devices or purposes unknown. The IAEA now operates

8600-438: The real EMD GP38-2 locomotive—which is the prototype of Athearn 's (among other manufacturers) locomotive model. Technically, any non-living object can serve as a prototype for a model, including structures, equipment, and appliances, and so on, but generally prototypes have come to mean full-size real-world vehicles including automobiles (the prototype 1957 Chevy has spawned many models), military equipment (such as M4 Shermans,

8700-463: The required features integrated into it, it becomes beta software for testing of the entire software and to adjust the program to respond correctly during situations unforeseen during development. Often the end users may not be able to provide a complete set of application objectives, detailed input, processing, or output requirements in the initial stage. After the user evaluation, another prototype will be built based on feedback from users, and again

8800-459: The result being a circuit that is electrically identical to the design but not physically identical to the final product. Open-source tools like Fritzing exist to document electronic prototypes (especially the breadboard-based ones) and move toward physical production. Prototyping platforms such as Arduino also simplify the task of programming and interacting with a microcontroller . The developer can choose to deploy their invention as-is using

8900-555: The scope of these agreements. If a nuclear-capable country does leave the NPT, it is likely to be reported by the IAEA to the United Nations Security Council , just as if it were in breach of its safeguards agreement. Trade sanctions would then be likely. IAEA safeguards can help ensure that uranium supplied as nuclear fuel and other nuclear supplies do not contribute to nuclear weapons proliferation. In fact,

9000-505: The spread of dangerous nuclear materials. It marches our nuclear policy in exactly the wrong direction. ... This is no time to change America into a plutonium society." Instead of investing public resources in the breeder demonstration project, he urged attention to improving the safety of existing nuclear technology. The Clinch River Breeder Reactor Project was revived after President Ronald Reagan took office in 1981. In spite of growing opposition from Congress and analysts inside and outside

9100-470: The spread of nuclear weapons did not begin until the early 1960s, after four nations (the United States, the Soviet Union, the United Kingdom and France) had acquired nuclear weapons (see List of states with nuclear weapons for more information). Although these efforts stalled in the early 1960s, they renewed once again in 1964, after China detonated a nuclear weapon. In 1968, governments represented at

9200-524: The treaty if they forswear nuclear weapons. Research into the development of nuclear weapons was initially undertaken during World War II by the United States (in cooperation with the United Kingdom and Canada), Germany, Japan, and the USSR. The United States was the first and is the only country to have used a nuclear weapon in war, when it used two bombs against Japan in August 1945. After surrendering to end

9300-531: The use of nuclear materials. This verification is a key element in the international system which ensures that uranium in particular is used only for peaceful purposes. Parties to the NPT agree to accept technical safeguard measures applied by the IAEA. These require that operators of nuclear facilities maintain and declare detailed accounting records of all movements and transactions involving nuclear material. Over 550 facilities and several hundred other locations are subject to regular inspection, and their records and

9400-616: The war, Germany and Japan ceased to be involved in any nuclear weapon research. In August 1949, the USSR tested a nuclear weapon , becoming the second country to detonate a nuclear bomb. The United Kingdom first tested a nuclear weapon in October 1952. France first tested a nuclear weapon in 1960. The People's Republic of China detonated a nuclear weapon in 1964. India conducted its first nuclear test in 1974, which prompted Pakistan to develop its own nuclear program and, when India conducted

9500-650: The world's longing for peace and security." With this remark, Baruch helped launch the field of nuclear ethics , to which many policy experts and scholars have contributed. Although the Baruch Plan enjoyed wide international support, it failed to emerge from the UNAEC because the Soviet Union planned to veto it in the Security Council. Still, it remained official American policy until 1953, when President Eisenhower made his " Atoms for Peace " proposal before

9600-491: The worldwide application of those safeguards and the substantial world trade in uranium for nuclear electricity make the proliferation of nuclear weapons much less likely. The Additional Protocol, once it is widely in force, will provide credible assurance that there are no undeclared nuclear materials or activities in the states concerned. This will be a major step forward in preventing nuclear proliferation. The Nuclear Suppliers Group communicated its guidelines, essentially

9700-446: Was estimated that the market price of mined, processed uranium, then $ 25 per pound, would have to increase to nearly $ 165 per pound in 1981 dollars before the breeder would become financially competitive with the conventional light-water nuclear reactor. United States electric utility companies were reluctant to invest in such an expensive technology. Concerns about potential nuclear weapons proliferation were another serious issue for

9800-497: Was finally canceled in 1983, the General Accounting Office of Congress estimated the total project cost at $ 8 billion. Another issue was the high cost of building and operating breeder reactors to produce electricity. In 1981, it was estimated that construction costs for a fast breeder reactor would be twice the cost of building a conventional light-water nuclear reactor of similar capacity. That same year it

9900-497: Was made at the meeting of the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) in Vienna. As of February 2006 Iran formally announced that uranium enrichment within their borders has continued. Iran claims it is for peaceful purposes but the United Kingdom, France, Germany, and the United States claim the purpose is for nuclear weapon research and construction. India , Pakistan and Israel have been "threshold" countries in terms of

10000-460: Was signed with Russia for the country's first large nuclear power plant, comprising two VVER-1000 reactors, under a Russian-financed US$ 3 billion contract. The first unit is due to be commissioned in 2007. A further two Russian units are under consideration for the site. Nuclear power supplied 3.1% of India's electricity in 2000. Its weapons material appears to come from a Canadian-designed 40 MW "research" reactor which started up in 1960, well before

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