300 Nature Vol.

271 26 January 1978

correspondence
Conserving uranium The use of accelrerators for breedring group by the unfortunate misplacing of
significant quantilties of fuel demarnds the sentences in the article.
SrR,-We rread with interest the rreoent machines giving outputs ;two or three Yours faithfully
articLe by John Dawes on this topic orders of magnitude gDeat,er than the R. w. J. KEAY
(1 December, pagce 376). However, it most powerful machines built so far. The Royal Society,
does contad,n a number of sc~entific The breeder ~tarrget ris nothing less than London
eJ:;!'ots ,a,nd misleading st:<Luements which a very major reactor in its own right.
we believre rit Lis our duty to IPOirrut out. Studies of such a system at Brookhaven
He is incorrect in sta:t:irng that the suggest a cost/gm of 239 Pu thr;ee to five
differ:encre betwe.en the 238 0--::>""Pu and times grearter than that of equivalent Anti-Miillerian hormone
the "'Th--::> 233 0 reactions ffis that the .enri,ched mu. The hazard~ of such a
first needs fast neutrons whiie the SrR,-In a recent issue of Nature the
system could ceJ:;tainly not be less than
second earn use slow ones. In fact the authors D. Tran, N. Meusy-Dessolle
that of a ma,jor Deactor syst~em.
oross-s~ections for the two reactions are
and N. Josso report on a testicular
We do not wish to givre the
almost idenhcal aJt all rener,gies <.~Jnd factor distinct from testosterone which
impre.ssrion ~that we ane in any way
therefore they have very simHar bveed- mediates regression of Mullerian ducts
antagonistic to the ,thorium cycle or to
ing character:ist,ics. The reaction in male foetuses (Nature 269, 411-412;
accderator bneeding. We wish merrely
'''0--::>'"'Pu oocurs to a very consider- 1977). Apart from the heading of their
to warn against the temptation of
able extent in thermarl reaotors. In fact article which read "Anti-Mullerian
assuming, like the grass being gmene,r
about one third of rthe enerrgy output hormone, etc." (and which caused
on ,the other side of the fence, that underlining and exclamation marks by
of a :thermal reactor arises from the problems of an alternative te,chno1ogy
"'Pu produced within it and then some of my merry colleagues) I do not
ane necessarily less than those of a consider it appropriate to use labora-
burnred in situ. Thus ~n ~the UK we technology uporn which one has
ralrready gret between 4 and 5% of our tory-born artificial words such as
embarked. 'testicular anti-MUllerian activity',
electricity from the fission of Yours farithfully,
plutonium. 'Mullerian regression' and others in a
A. T. G. FERGUSON
The control of both thermal and fast scientific communication. I wonder
I. M. BLAIR
neactors is based on the delayed how this obvious jargon escaped your
AERE Harwell referee's attention*. Besides there is no
neutron contrribution <.~Jnd this irs ·on a
time scale of seconds mther than 'MUllerian ~regression' but a regression
micmcseconds. The only mechanisms of the outline, the diameter or so of the
~or a sudden rinonease in Deactiv]ty are Transposed sentence Mullerian duct; likewise there is neither
loss of coolant or fuel mov,ement, a 'testicular anti-Mi.illerian activity'
Sm,-lt has been brought to the atten- nor an 'anti-Mullerian hormone'. I
neither of which could occur faster tion of tM editors of volume 23 of
than the control rods could movre. am sure that Johannes Pete~r Muller
Biographical Memoirs of Fellows of (1800-1858) would agree.
Turning to the 233 U / 232 Th fud cycle the Royal Society that certain sen-
we would fiDst chalrleng:e the statement Yours faithfully,
tences in the memoir on Professor GERHARD H. MuLLER
thart 233 0 is automatically safeguarded
C. H. Waddington may be read as Universitiit des Saarlandes
against riHregal diversion by the intense
derogatory of the work of Dr Ruth Saarbriicken, West Germany
}'-rays coming from the simuitraneously
Clayton and her colleagues. This was
produced '"U. This isotope does not *It didn't, but the authors claimed that
in no way the intention of the author,
emit 'Y-rays. It decays with a 70· year since the name had been used in all
but arose from an unfortunate trans-
ha,Jf-life by a-emission to ""Th which their recent publications, a change now
position of sentences in an early draft.
does emit the 'Y-rays to which Dr Davies would cause confusion.-ED.
refers. Thus only aftrer a considerable The author therefore wishes to amend
period does the J'•aotivilty huild up to a the last six lines of page 583 to read:
sufficient level to afford [ntrinsic pro- ". . . work that Waddington had
tection. originally envisaged. A notable excep- Essential relativity
With regard to ,the waste disposal tion which fitted into Waddington's
prob!'em the thonium cycle may give original concept was the work on the Sm,-ln connection with Paul Davies'
rrise to fewer problems from the pro- development of the avian lens in the kind review of the second edition of
duction of long ]rived higher activiiti,es group led by Mrs Ruth Clayton. The my book Essential Relativity (Nature
but on the other hand much more laboratory became well known for the 22 September 1977) I wonder if you
Pu 238 and 234 0 is produced. The latter DNA-RNA investigations which would allow me to correct one slight
isotope decays to the very hazardous earned a world reputation for at least error. The coordinates of accelerated
""Ra. two of the leading workers." observers in Minkowski space, which
Accderators aDe r'eplacing reactors We must unreservedly withdraw all have recently been used in the study of
for some forms of neutron 11esearch inferences to the eff,ect that Mrs Clay- black holes, are elaborated on, albeit
because they can produce neutrons ~n ton's work and ,that of her group is in a later section on Kruskal space.
shovt pulses and mn give higher peak anything other than of · the highest Indeed, this was one of the more sig-
fluxes than a Deactor. However, the class and of a deserved worldwide nificant additions to the second edition.
mean flux from such systems up to reputation and we whole-heartedly Yours faithfully,
pJ:;esent is lower by orders of magnitude apologise to Mrs Clayton for the em- VVOLFGANG RINDLER
than in 11esearch 11eaotors. barrassment caused to her and her The University of Texas at Dallas

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