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carlwillis.bsky.social
I am Professor of Practice on the Nuclear Engineering faculty at the University of New Mexico, where I teach with and supervise the AGN-201M nuclear reactor. I'm a husband, and stepfather to three wonderful kids. 🚫MAGA 🚫bots 🚫scams Opinions my own.
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The UNM NE Department is hosting a FREE residential summer camp July 20-26 for HS students. See link in attached flyer for details. #Nuclear #Engineering @unm.edu @unmengineering.bsky.social #NukeSky ☢️fun

submitted 20 hours ago • 0 comments

#UNM Nuclear Engineering is hosting a residential, hands-on summer camp for HS students, July 20-26. It's FREE to attend--and should be a lot of fun. I'm director. Spread the word & register here: experiencenuclearengineering.totalcamps.com/About%20Us Questions? Let me know! #NukeSky ☢️fun

submitted 1 day ago • 0 comments

The Mind Research Network (www.mrn.org) on UNM North Campus uses a nice 3-tesla MRI for research. If you're in #Albuquerque, sign up for a study, contribute to important research, get cool images & corporeally experience Faraday's Law. T1- and T2-weighted examples of my own dome attached.

submitted 1 day ago • 1 comment

www.dailylobo.com/article/2025...

submitted 25 days ago • 1 comment

Gingersnap is home and ready to #chonk out after getting treated for hyperthyroidism with iodine-131. His head reads about 10 mR/h at 10 cm. Not great, not terrible, as they say. ☢️fun

submitted 28 days ago • 2 comments

F-18 is widely used in medical PET imaging. I ran a gamma spec on a discarded F-18 vial (F-18 all decayed away, no activity measurable on a Geiger counter), and the traces of radioactive Re, Co, Cr, and Tc point to a variety of proton reactions on W, Fe, and Mo in the cyclotron target! ☢️fun

submitted 33 days ago • 3 comments

It's wages-of-sin-are-death Wednesday out on Central Avenue. I was invited to "get up with Jesus on the cross today," which I politely declined.

submitted 72 days ago • 0 comments

Jeff #Bezos is a disgrace--an enshittifying force in US civics and the marketplace, along with fellow dissipated plutocrats / trumpanzees Musk & Zuckerberg. Accordingly, I've decided to unsubscribe from his rag (WaPo) and his junk emporium (Amazon Prime). Feeling better already.

submitted 79 days ago • 5 comments

In "honor" of the appointment of RFK Jr. as Secretary of Health, I made a short video that looks at the kinds of radioactive products that flourish in the alt health and wellness ecosystem of a society struggling with declining information literacy. #NukeSky ☢️fun www.youtube.com/shorts/S4Qjz...

submitted 91 days ago • 4 comments

For sale: Polimaster PM1703GN PRD. Working fine (both gamma & neutron response). This device uses both CsI and LiI scintillator modules and reads in roentgen units for gamma and counts/sec for neutrons. Has data logging abilities. $200 OBO. #HobbyNuke

submitted 100 days ago • 6 comments

For sale: Exploranium GR-100 PRD, working fine but heavily used, with scratches on the screen! The GR-100 is the gamma-only version of this detector (though it has a neutron indicator lamp). It's a little CsI scintillator with dosimetric readout and data logging. $150 OBO. #HobbyNuke

submitted 100 days ago • 2 comments

Hand-loading of nuclear fuel into the #UNM AGN-201M reactor, part of an approach-to-critical teaching lab we perform every year. The fuel is enriched UO2 in HDPE plastic. With our 5W licensed power, the dose rate near the core is less than 10 mrem/h. #NukeSky

submitted 100 days ago • 2 comments

He's a big trump donor & climate denier. Like any of this cabinet, I'd wait to offer congratulations publicly unless & until he demonstrates an ability to be reasonable and not corrupt in office! Perry didn't know what DOE did 😂, but merits an attaboy (I suppose) for not being flagrantly corrupt.

submitted 102 days ago • 0 comments

Using Pu-242 has resulted in some of the best colors I’ve ever seen as a chemist. 🤩 @realtimechem.bsky.social @berkeleylab.lbl.gov #plutonium #realtimechem #fblockrocks #radiochemistry

submitted 104 days ago • 3 comments

The New York Times is so blatantly in the tank for Trump. Calling Canada and Mexico "recalcitrant" is just beyond the pale. It's straight up propaganda.

submitted 104 days ago • 69 comments

Several conversations today w people in the key executive departments. And while the particulars are hard to pin down my impression is that the Musk take over stuff is considerably worse than is being presented in the press. By this I don’t necessarily things they *done* yet but the level of …

submitted 104 days ago • 584 comments

Another nucleus explodin' in the CdTe Advacam Minipix at 38,000 feet from #cosmic rays. See downthread for the corresponding data extracted & plotted w Matplotlib. ☢️fun #physics #fission

submitted 104 days ago • 2 comments

FREE to a good home: 3-rank 2-manual + pedal pipe #organ located in storage in #Albuquerque. Pipes & chest vintage 1917 Moller, case is hardwood & more recent. Action is electric. 8' closed wood, 4' open metal, 8' reed (oboe). You need to have a hobby mentality to set up & maintain.

submitted 104 days ago • 9 comments

Countries targeted by trumpist tariffs should retaliate by punishing the front-row plutocrats at the felon's inauguration. That's where the money is, that's the true tumpanzee base, that's who would bawl the loudest, and that would make a lot of people happy. pluralistic.net/2025/01/15/b...

submitted 105 days ago • 0 comments