{"id":589946,"date":"2026-07-17T06:14:08","date_gmt":"2026-07-17T06:14:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/589946\/"},"modified":"2026-07-17T06:14:08","modified_gmt":"2026-07-17T06:14:08","slug":"nature-study-identifies-a-new-way-to-spot-nuclear-weapons-in-orbit","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/589946\/","title":{"rendered":"Nature study identifies a new way to spot nuclear weapons in orbit"},"content":{"rendered":"

NEW YORK \u2014 A study published last week in Nature Astronomy<\/a> has proposed a new satellite design and technique to detect thermonuclear warheads in space. Funded in part by the United States National Nuclear Security Administration, it\u2019s the first study proposing any technique for identifying orbital warheads in peer-reviewed literature.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Today\u2019s satellites can\u2019t detect nuclear weapons in orbit. This makes it hard to verify the 1967 Outer Space Treaty, which has been signed and ratified by 118 member states of the United Nations and\u00a0forbids \u201cnuclear weapons or other weapons of mass destruction in orbit.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n

In 2024, U.S. intelligence officials alleged a Russian military radar satellite, Kosmos-2553, perched in a radiation-rich zone, was a testbed for developing a potential anti-satellite orbital nuclear weapon<\/a>.<\/p>\n

The new study, from Areg Danagoulian, a nuclear physicist and non-proliferation researcher at MIT, offers a verification mechanism to the treaty using radiation trapped in the earth\u2019s inner magnetosphere to probe for fissionable material in warheads.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u201cIt helps ground the conversation of technical nuclear weapon detection in space with starting-point parameters that describe the required orbital mechanics to make it all happen,\u201d Thomas Gonzalez Roberts, an assistant professor of aerospace engineering and international affairs at Georgia Institute of Technology who was not involved in the study, told SpaceNews.<\/p>\n

The radiation-rich zone is the inner Van Allen radiation belt, a region bounded by Earth\u2019s magnetic field roughly 2,000 kilometers in the upper reaches of low Earth orbit. In the event of an attack, the belt would trap radiation from a detonation within its confines, damaging nearby satellites. At lower orbits, radiation has more avenues to escape, limiting destruction.\u00a0<\/p>\n

While Russia has denied developing such a weapon, Danagoulian studied means to spot one. Fissile material leaves a tell-tale signature through spallation, in which a nucleus breaks up and emits particles, including neutrons. Danagoilian noted the Van Allen belt is a rich source of the energetic protons that can trigger spallation in nearby fissile material.<\/p>\n

In the study, Danagoulian simulated a 9U CubeSat inspecting satellite equipped with a neutron detector that could detect spallation on a flyby. His design sandwiches a plastic neutron scintillator between a single-crystal diamond detector, which detects the neutrons and vetoes false-positive signals from background noise.<\/p>\n

With an improved signal-to-noise ratio, an inspecting satellite positioned 4 kilometers away from a warhead-bearing satellite of Kosmos-2553\u2019s type (made of aluminium and hydrogenous materials), could confirm a thermonuclear signature within a week-long observation window. With about ten satellites, that window shrinks to 15 hours, and further to an hour at 1 kilometer.<\/p>\n

While close in-orbit inspections have precedents and aren\u2019t prohibited, they can be seen as escalatory and threatening to a country counterpart. \u201cThe concept is most compelling as part of a cooperative treaty verification regime,\u201d Roberts said. \u201cIf both parties agree to the inspection, these proximity operations are achievable and politically much more acceptable than unilateral, uncoordinated inspections.\u201d<\/p>\n

However, the proposed technique ensures compliance only with satellites operating in the inner Van Allen belt. \u201cIt\u2019s a solution for one orbital regime, but it\u2019s not a one size fits all problem,\u201d Isobel Porteous, a space policy expert with the Council for Strategic Risks, and head of business development at EarthTraq Corporation, said. (Porteous studied ways to detect nuclear weapons in space for her undergraduate thesis at Stanford, showing that it\u2019s feasible to X-ray a warhead or detect for gamma rays.)<\/p>\n

Angela Di Fulvio, a nuclear physicist in nuclear safety and non-proliferation and one of the study\u2019s peer reviewers, proposed next steps. \u201cIt\u2019s a simulation paper. Just like any simulation work, it would be great to validate it and verify it. And I\u2019m looking forward to seeing that validation.\u201d<\/p>\n

Danagoulian hopes to do just that. \u201cWhat I described in a paper is a feasibility study that shows that this is scientifically feasible, but it\u2019s still from an engineering point of view, it\u2019s a very difficult problem,\u201d he said. \u201cMy hope is to collaborate with national labs to essentially create such a device, miniature device, test it, do a proof of concept.\u201d<\/p>\n

While nuclear weapons are a hot topic, so is the related question in policy circles whether it\u2019s possible to discriminate between them and nuclear propulsion engines. \u201cThat\u2019s going to be an important question,\u201d Katherine Melbourne, a space policy analyst at The Aerospace Corporation, said.\u00a0<\/p>\n

The technique can discriminate between a reactor that\u2019s online from a weapon, simply because the former exudes enormous heat, Danagoulian said. However, it can\u2019t discriminate between an offline reactor. \u201cWe are currently working on closing that gap.\u201d<\/p>\n

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