Berkeley Nucleonics Corporation

Berkeley Nucleonics Corporation, (BNC), of San Rafael, California, United States, is an electronics company whose products range from pulse generators and digital delay generators to specialized handheld instruments and portal monitors capable of radiation detection and isotope identification.

History

Founded in 1960, BNC initially developed pulse generators with precise, stable amplitudes and shapes for the nuclear spectroscopy community. The product line later expanded to general-purpose pulse generators and digital delay generators. To date, BNC has introduced 15 different Digital delay generators with delay resolution as low as 50 pico-seconds. In the mid 1990s, BNC began building a strong market position in radiation detection and analysis instrumentation.

In 2001, two top executives from BNC and the firm itself were charged with violations of export regulations and conspiracy. The company sent a number of nuclear pulse generators to India's Department of Atomic Energy in the beginning in 1998 shortly after sanctions were placed on the country for testing nuclear weapons. Lawers defending BNC and the two executives argued that the violations were unintentional and government agents "cajoled" BNC to make the sales. BNC lawyer Steve Bauer remarked that "there was a slight change in export regulations a few years ago that many companies missed. When (Berkeley Nucleonics) found this out, they tried to cooperate with the government to fix any problem and, for that, they get indicted." The company stated that the existing customer in India had been purchasing the same product for over 20 years, and the change in US export requirements in 1998 caused all shipments to this customer to require a license. Gary Milhollin from the Wisconsin Project on Nuclear Arms Control called the exports "outrageous" and claimed that the firm should have known better. [The San Francisco Chronicle, July 15, 2001, "Marin firm entangled in sting," Pg. A23] [The San Francisco Chronicle, August 30, 2001, "Marin firm charged with export violations," Business, Pg. B5]

The owner of Berkeley Nucleonics, David Brown, was convicted of 7 counts of export violations and 1 count of conspiracy.

Products

Berkeley Nucleonics Corporation sells a number of products, including

Electronic Products
* Digital delay generators
* Pulse generators - Optical and Electrical
* NIM Pulse Generators - (Nuclear Instrumentation Modules)
* Arbitrary waveform generators and Function generatorsRadiation Products
* Handheld radiation detection
* Isotope identification
* Portal and vehicle-based systems
* Networked radiation equipmentChemical Analysis Products
* Portable GC

References

External links

* [http://www.berkeleynucleonics.com Berkeley Nucleonics Corporation] Official site.
* [http://www.laboratorytalk.com/news/bek/bek000.html LaboratoryTalk.com - Profile of Berkeley Nucleonics Corporation]