Catálogo de publicaciones

Nuclear waste--the radioactive by-product from nuclear power generation, nuclear weapons and medical isotope production--is one of the most challenging types of waste for our society to manage. Its high radioactivity requires that it be safely isolated from humans and the environment until it no longer poses a hazard; of the order of a million years. This review will show that nuclear waste management is a world of materials science and engineering challenges that must stand the test of time, from designing engineered facilities to isolate waste from future civilisations, to inventing new materials to immobilise weapons-grade and surplus civil plutonium. Due to the ever-changing nature of nuclear waste, which transforms its chemical composition and physical properties through radioactive decay processes, nuclear waste management is also a race against time that will continue to drive research and development for many years to come.

There are some physics controversies that no amount of physics research can answer. Why is doing string theory scientific despite its lack of empirical predictions? How should we interpret quantum mechanics? What is the nature of time and space? What constitutes fundamental physics? One can answer these questions dogmatically by appealing to textbooks or by making rough and ready pronouncements, but the issues behind them can often be significantly clarified by the sort of systematic, critical reflection that philosophy practices. Philosophy comes in several traditions. Three of these--known as 'analytic,' 'pragmatic' and 'continental'--have paid particular attention to physics. This ebook illustrates philosophy of physics in action, and how it can help physics, by using four examples from physics to exhibit the aims and value of these philosophical approaches.