Year
2006
Abstract
Recent decade has seen dramatic technological advances in the development of experimental installations for fundamental and applied research in the field of high-energy-density physics. This provided a much broader access to the new generation of high-intensity particle accelerators, high-brilliance sources of synchrotron radiation, and powerful lasers. These developments pose a safeguards challenge, since such installations, built in a number of States, in addition to the applications with very small quantities of nuclear material, can be used for nuclear weaponization-relevant R&D, while not involving nuclear material. In addition to the review of the emerging technologies, the paper discusses difficulties associated with verification activities at high-energy-density installations and possible directions for the enhancement of the IAEA’s capabilities in this area.