this post was submitted on 03 Apr 2024
705 points (98.1% liked)

Science Memes

11223 readers
2835 users here now

Welcome to c/science_memes @ Mander.xyz!

A place for majestic STEMLORD peacocking, as well as memes about the realities of working in a lab.



Rules

  1. Don't throw mud. Behave like an intellectual and remember the human.
  2. Keep it rooted (on topic).
  3. No spam.
  4. Infographics welcome, get schooled.

This is a science community. We use the Dawkins definition of meme.



Research Committee

Other Mander Communities

Science and Research

Biology and Life Sciences

Physical Sciences

Humanities and Social Sciences

Practical and Applied Sciences

Memes

Miscellaneous

founded 2 years ago
MODERATORS
 
you are viewing a single comment's thread
view the rest of the comments
[–] Chestnut@lemmy.world 5 points 7 months ago (2 children)

Can they really get out THAT many calories from a gram of Uranium?! That's insane!

I wish I cared more and would verify it

[–] Voroxpete@sh.itjust.works 9 points 7 months ago

Calories are just a measure of the energy released by a material.

Normally they're measured by burning the material, so it's not really accurate to say that you can get that many calories from uranium. On the other hand the whole concept is fucking stupid anyway, because it's measured by burning the material. Technically, a kilo of dry sawdust has 4800 calories (more than double the daily calorie requirement of the average person).

[–] qjkxbmwvz@startrek.website 3 points 7 months ago

I just googled around and I think the meme inflated the numbers. Fast neutron reactor gets 28GJ/g, which is "only" about 7 million food (kilo) calories.