Tritium consists of about 4.5 kilograms of plutonium-239. Since tritium undergoes radioactive decay, and is also difficult to confine physically, the much larger secondary charge of heavy hydrogen isotopes needed in a true hydrogen bomb uses solid lithium deuteride as its source of deuterium and tritium, producing the tritium "in situ" during secondary ignition. During the detonation of the primary fission bomb stage in a thermonuclear weapon (Teller-Ullam staging), the sparkplug, a cylinder of U-235/Pu-239 at the center of the fusion stage(s), begins to fission in a chain reaction, from excess neutrons channeled from the primary. The neutrons released from the
Atomic vapor laser isotope separation Atomic vapor laser isotope separation Atomic vapor laser isotope separation, or AVLIS, is a method by which specially tuned lasers are used to separate isotopes of uranium using selective ionization of hyperfine transitions. As compared to gas centrifuges the AVLIS process provides high energy efficiency, high separation factors, and a low volume of radioactive waste. A similar technology, using molecules instead of atoms, is molecular laser isotope separation (MLIS). The absorption lines of and U differ slightly due to hyperfine structure; for example, the U absorption peak of 502.74 nanometers shifts to 502.73 nm in U. AVLIS uses tunable dye