Liquid metal cooled reactor Clementine was the first liquid metal cooled nuclear reactor and used mercury coolant, thought to be the obvious choice since it is liquid at room temperature. However, because of disadvantages including high toxicity, high vapor pressure even at room temperature, low boiling point, producing noxious fumes when heated, relatively low thermal conductivity, and a high neutron cross-section, it has fallen out of favor. Sodium and NaK (a eutectic sodium-potassium alloy) do not corrode steel to any significant degree and are compatible with many nuclear fuels, allowing for a wide choice of structural materials. They do, however, ignite spontaneously on contact
Room Temperature (novel) (body functions are discussed extensively, perhaps prompted by the baby's presence), or the juxtaposition of Debussy and Skippy peanut butter jars in a symphonic poem. The novel was received warmly but without great enthusiasm, as an enjoyable if slightly demure domestic follow-up to "The Mezzanine". Mike may be expressing Baker's approach to writing when he thinks "...that with a little concentration one's whole life could be reconstructed from any single twenty-minute period randomly or almost randomly selected." Room Temperature (novel) Room Temperature is Nicholson Baker's second book, and continues the genre established in his first novel "The Mezzanine", though this