Nuclear materials smuggling

On 7 October, Georgia's State Security Service announced the arrest of a Georgian citizen allegedly attempting to sell U-238 to a foreign national for $700,000. To be clear, U-238 is not highly enriched uranium. Producing that requires sophisticated nuclear infrastructure and processing capabilities.

So why does intercepting it still matter?

First, this is not an isolated incident. Georgia has experienced other nuclear material interdictions over recent decades and the International Atomic Energy Agency's Incident and Trafficking Database recorded 147 incidents involving nuclear and other radioactive materials outside regulatory control in 2024 alone. Not all were trafficking incidents, but they demonstrate the continuing challenge of maintaining control over nuclear and radioactive materials.

Second, is the detection challenge of U-238 because it is primarily an alpha emitter. Alpha radiation has extremely limited penetration and can be stopped by something as simple as a sheet of paper. Uranium can also produce detectable gamma radiation, but the effectiveness of radiological screening depends on the material, its quantity, its physical condition and the equipment being used.

This is where chemical detection provides a fundamentally different capability. It identifies the actual material itself through its chemical properties, whereas radiological detection answers a different question as it identifies radiation emitted by a material.

Colorimetric Detection of Nuclear Materials (#CodeNu) identifies uranium and plutonium directly through a target chemical reaction, rather than relying upon radiation emissions. A simple wipe of a suspect surface produces a visible colour change when uranium or plutonium is present.

Chemical testing doesn't replace traditional radiological monitoring and it doesn't determine uranium enrichment or isotopic composition. They answer different questions.

1. Radiological instruments ask: is radiation being emitted here?
2. CodeNu asks: is uranium or plutonium present here in the first place, regardless of the strength of its radiation emissions?

Used together, those are powerful and complementary pieces of information for people tasked with identifying potentially hazardous nuclear material in the field.

The challenge in nuclear security isn't simply detecting radiation. It's identifying nuclear material, including in circumstances where radiation alone may not tell the whole story.

#NuclearSecurity #Uranium #BorderSecurity #RadiologicalSafety #CodeNu #deeptech