Britain said that together with its Challenger 2 tanks, it would also be sending Ukraine armour-piercing shells containing depleted uranium (DU). Russian President Vladimir Putin accused London of proliferating "weapons with a nuclear component", comments Britain labelled "disinformation".
So, what are these depleted uranium shells? And are they related to nuclear weapons?The isotope U-235 is extracted from natural uranium ore and used both as fuel for reactors and in nuclear weapons.
This process is called enrichment. But the content of the "useful" isotope in the ore is insignificant - about 10 per cent. The remaining 90 per cent of the isotope contains negligible amounts of U-235, which consist mainly of the slightly radioactive U-238.
This is depleted uranium which can be described as waste from the enrichment process.Depleted uranium is very dense. This means that it is much heavier than, for example, steel shells of the same size.