Word.ws English Dictionary

prompt criticality

prompt criticality noun: the point at which the prompt neutrons produced by a nuclear fission chain reaction are just sufficient to sustain the chain reaction on their own (the state of being prompt critical); past this point, changes in reaction power are controlled by changes in the prompt neutron flux, and occur on a timeframe of milliseconds, too rapidly to be controlled by mechanical means.

Noun

prompt criticality (usually uncountable, plural prompt criticalities)

  1. (usually, nuclear physics) The point at which the prompt neutrons produced by a nuclear fission chain reaction are just sufficient to sustain the chain reaction on their own (the state of being prompt critical); past this point, changes in reaction power are controlled by changes in the prompt neutron flux, and occur on a timeframe of milliseconds, too rapidly to be controlled by mechanical means.
    • The system is thought to have approached prompt criticality, at which time the rate of power increase would have been determined by the neutron lifetime (on the order of milliseconds).2000, Thomas P. McLaughlin with Shean P. Monahan, Norman L. Pruvost, Vladimir V. Frolov, Boris G. Ryazanov, and Victor I. Sviridov, “I. A. 19. Idaho Chemical Processing Plant, 17 October 1978”, in A...

Forms of prompt criticality

pluralprompt criticalities

Questions about prompt criticality

What does prompt criticality mean?
Prompt criticality means the point at which the prompt neutrons produced by a nuclear fission chain reaction are just sufficient to sustain the chain reaction on their own (the state of being prompt critical); past this point, changes in reaction power are controlled by changes in the prompt neutron flux, and occur on a timeframe of milliseconds, too rapidly to be controlled by mechanical means.
What part of speech is prompt criticality?
Prompt criticality is a noun.
What is the plural of prompt criticality?
The plural of prompt criticality is prompt criticalities.

Words near prompt criticality in the dictionary

  1. prompt
  2. prompt book
  3. prompt crafting
  4. prompt critical
  5. prompt criticalities
  6. prompt criticality
  7. prompt engineer
  8. prompt engineering
  9. prompt engineers
  10. prompt injection
  11. prompt injections

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: prompt criticality (page history and authors). Text available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 license. Word.ws reformatted the entry and added links. Wiktionary data of 2026-09-02.

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