May 3, 2018
We are pleased to release an online course on the technical underpinnings of nuclear nonproliferation with a special focus on Iran, North Korea, and trafficking in nuclear commodities. The presenters are David Albright, President of the Institute for Science and International Security, and Houston Wood, Institute Board member and Professor of Mechanical and Aerospace Engineering at the University of Virginia. They are longstanding nuclear experts with experience in many of the most pressing nuclear nonproliferation cases of the last four decades.
The course lectures provide an introduction to the key facets of developing the wherewithal to make nuclear weapons, including uranium enrichment, plutonium production and separation, and nuclear weaponization. Gas centrifuges are discussed extensively since they are today the dominant method to produce enriched uranium and have been favored by proliferant states, such as Pakistan, North Korea, Iran, and Iraq, among ot
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Reports
by David Albright, Andrea Stricker, and Houston Wood
October 1, 2013
Executive Summary
Of the roughly two dozen countries that have pursued or obtained nuclear weapons during the
last fifty years, almost all of them depended importantly on foreign supplies. As a short term
projection over the next five to ten years, illicit nuclear trade is likely to be conducted by several
nations seeking nuclear weapons or wanting to maintain existing nuclear weapons arsenals or
capabilities. Additional states in regions of proliferation concern may utilize smuggling methods
to acquire advanced, ostensibly civilian, nuclear technology including uranium enrichment and
plutonium production and separation capabilities. And despite many recent, particularly United