

In the 70s, Scientists Discovered a 2BN-Year-Old Nuclear Reactor in West Africa - lelf
https://medium.com/the-physics-arxiv-blog/in-the-1970s-scientists-discovered-a-2-billion-year-old-nuclear-reactor-in-west-africa-4472460b82c2

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anon1110
It is some kind of failure that no part of this was preserved for scientific
study, given the unique and non-reproducible nature of the ancient reactor.
Such a loss!

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matthewmcg
The neat detail (for me, anyway) is that a natural uranium reactor of this
sort was possible in the distant past when U-235 was relatively more abundant:

"When the ore in Gabon was laid down some 2 billion years ago, the
concentration of uranium-235 would have been about 4 per cent, more than
enough for a self-sustaining nuclear reaction."

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iwwr
There was a relatively short window for that to happen since uranium is
soluble in water only in the presence of oxygen, and significant uranium
deposits develop through hydrothermal processes.

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CapitalistCartr
As discussed on HN before:

[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=7731753](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=7731753)

[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=2349182](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=2349182)

