This review presents the current state of the knowledge regarding the use of radioactive sources to generate photonic light in scintillators as converters of ionizing radiation to electricity in photovoltaic cells. The possibility of using the phenomenon of the excitation of light photons in the scintillation materials during the interaction with particles and photons of ionizing radiation was analyzed in detail. The light photons obtained in such a way can generate an electric charge in photovoltaic cells. The whole process can be named as a nuclear cell (nuclear battery). Theoretically, the use of such physical phenomena seems to be an ideal practical solution to meet the energy needs of the modern world. However, there are many physical and technical problems that limit its widespread use in practical applications. In an ideal system, the ionizing radiation sources can emit the radiation for billions of years, and the energy of particles and photons from the radiation can be converted into photons in the scintillation material, with energy suitable to generate a photoelectric effect in a photovoltaic cell. Such a cascade sequence of different physical phenomena allows, from a theoretical point of view, for the creation of a virtually inexhaustible source of electricity. This review of historical and current literature reports aims to bring closer the idea of “energy perpetuum mobile”, which has troubled many scientists around the world for centuries.

Due to its costly and time-consuming nature and a wide range of passive barrier elements and tools for their breaching, testing the delay time of passive barriers is only possible as an experimental tool to verify expert judgements of said delay times. The article focuses on the possibility of creating and utilizing a new method of acquiring values of delay time for various passive barrier elements using expert judgements which could add to the creation of charts where interactions between the used elements of mechanical barriers and the potential tools for their bypassing would be assigned a temporal value. The article consists of basic description of methods of expert judgements previously applied for making prognoses of socio-economic development and in other societal areas, which are called soft system. In terms of the problem of delay time, this method needed to be modified in such a way that the prospective output would be expressible by a specific quantitative value. To achieve this goal, each stage of the expert judgements was adjusted to the use of suitable scientific methods to select appropriate experts and then to achieve and process the expert data. High emphasis was placed on evaluation of quality and reliability of the expert judgements, which takes into account the specifics of expert selection such as their low numbers, specialization and practical experience.

Globalization occurs directly or indirectly in all aspects of human life whether it is a private area or a work area. The minimization of globalization impact can be done through different instruments that focus on different causes. One of these tools, which act on various causes and minimize the negatives of globalization, is the concept of corporate social responsibility (CSR). Implementation of this business concept is being implemented by more and more companies from different economic sectors. This trend is very important not only for the organizations themselves and their surroundings, but also for the whole society. Currently, there are synergies f this concept with area of risk management. However, this synergy has to be supported by appropriate competencies of the managers applying the CSR within the company. In the context of this article, we want to highlight the possibilities of the development of the managers from different economic sectors and different countries offered by the Competency Based e-portal of Security and Safety Engineering (eSEC). The eSEC portal has been created by the Faculty of Security Engineering in cooperation with EU partners and offers managers the competencies needed to successful implementation of the CSR concept.