TATB

| Main Article
| Discussion
| Related Articles  [?]
| Bibliography  [?]
| External Links  [?]
| Citable Version  [?]

|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|

This editable Main Article is under development and subject to a disclaimer.

[edit intro]

TATB, a compound with the IUPAC name 1,3,5-triamino-2,4,6-trinitrobenzene and the trivial name triamino-trinitrobenzene, is the best-known example of insensitive high explosives. Of those in production and whose existence is not classified information, it appears to be the most powerful and least sensitive, and is the principal explosive in the implosion initiation systems of U.S. nuclear weapons.

At first, its manufacturing costs were prohibitively expensive for other than nuclear applications, but new techniques of synthesis have lowered the cost and made it practical for other uses.[1] Indeed, the new synthesis has the added benefit of being able to use, as a precursor, two chemicals that are both dangerous and surplus to Cold War requirements, UDMH (unsymmetrical dimethylhydrazine) and Explosive D (ammonium picrate), in an environmentally safe way while recycling them into needed products.

## References[edit]

1. ↑ Addressing a Cold War Legacy with a New Way to Produce TATB, Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory, November 1996