Three key components to a fission reactor fuel rods, control rods, and moderator, control rods

are normally made of boron or cadmium

● Neutrons are key

How does a fission reactor work? Well first ceramic uranium pellets are made then stacked
upon each other then in cased zirconium metal tubes these tubes are called fuel rods. Your
average fission reactor has about 200 fuel rods. The fuel rods are also incased in graphite and
surrounded by water this water runs through a pipe and a pressurizer in a circuit. This water
gets really hot because of the energy released from the nuclear reaction. But because of its
contact with the uranium it becomes highly radioactive so it must remain contained. This hot
water heats up non radioactive water which turns into steam and turns a turbine then condenses
again into water to repeat the process.

Control rods are long skinny rods commonly made out of Boron or carbon; the control rods are
used to keep the reactor from melting down. By catching the spare neutrons from the reaction to
stop any and all uncontrolled chain reactions and to stop the fuel reactions from heating up too
much. The control rods are attached by electromagnets so if the power goes out the
electromagnets will immediately release the control rods into the reactor going into shut down
mode. For a modern reactor the control rods typical time for shut down is two seconds for 90%
reduction.

What is fusion?
Fusion is the reaction where spare neutrons run into nucleus and two more neutrons pop out
and the increases exponentially