Word: nuclear
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Dates: during 1940-1949
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Physicists will never be happy until they take the atom completely apart. Most of them already consider the atom bomb just a frontier skirmish. Last week they gathered at the University of California to discuss the big topic in nuclear physics: subatomic particles. To the American Physical Society, U.S. atom-busters described carefully laid plans for further busting...
...Army plans to invest some $90 million, a third of it in basic research. An additional $40 million of the Army's Manhattan District (nuclear) funds are earmarked for research. By last week the District was well along in arrangements for a chain of regional laboratories across the nation. Biggest: the Argonne Laboratory near Chicago, headed by 39-year-old Physicist Walter Henry Zinn. The University of Chicago, the Mayo Clinic and 22 other Midwest institutions will help run Argonne via an advisory board, will use it as a center for research in nuclear physics, biochemistry and other fields...
...controlling fission, the nuclear physicists' big problem was to calculate the probability that a given atom would capture a neutron traveling at a given speed. They found that in a certain type of pile the critical size at which a lump of enriched uranium begins to cook in a nonexplosive chain reaction is 1.5 kilograms (about 3⅓ Ibs.). Theoretically, a pile might heat up to the temperature of the sun (over 6,000°), but no known container can withstand more than 1,500°. The physicists discovered that the simplest way to throttle down a pile...
They listened approvingly to experts on everything. Indefatigable Harold Stassen* was there to talk about world cooperation. Fiery Fiorello LaGuardia made a moving plea for UNRRA. Physicist Harold C. Urey and Major General Leslie Groves, Grand Panjandrum of atomic energy, explained nuclear fission...
...physical revolution which Einstein started is not yet in sight. Perhaps it will stop itself-suddenly-in mid-development under the impact of that equation, E = mc2, which inspired the nuclear physicists to turn small bits of matter into world-shaking energy...