Omega
Post by beth on Jul 21, 2010 18:39:00 GMT -5
Joseph Coleman Carter III
Joseph Coleman Carter III, Nick Heinle's grandfather, was born in Versailles, Kentucky, on September 28, 1910. Son of a gentleman farmer, he spent his childhood hunting and fishing, where he learned to appreciate nature. He went to the United States Naval Academy at the age of 18, then went on to Columbia University were he received a Masters Degree in Mechanical Engineering. He was asked to join the Manhattan Project while at Columbia, where he worked under the direction of General Leslie Groves. During this time he and other engineers built a pilot version of the atomic bomb. One year later he and his new wife, Mary Leaphart, moved to Oak Ridge, Tennessee, where he worked on refining isotopes of uranium, and started work on designing nuclear submarines for the government. After leaving Oak Ridge, he went on to work for Argonne, a government lab, there he worked on development of the nuclear breeder reactor, which was designed to reuse spent fuel. In 1976, he returned to his old
Kentucky home, in Versailles, where he managed a farm and taught nuclear physics at the University of Kentucky. On June 26, 1992, he passed away after having a stroke.
Julius Robert Oppenheimer
J(ulius) Robert Oppenheimer was known as the father of the atomic bomb. From 1943 to 1945 he directed a laboratory at Los Alamos, where the designing and building (of the atomic bomb) took place. In 1947 to 1952 he headed the newly formed United States Atomic Energy Commission's advisory committee, and advised the U.S. Department of Defense. He also helped write the very 1st U.S. proposal for international control of nuclear energy! The AEC gave J. Robert Oppenheimer the highest honor it could give, the Enrico Fermi Award! After three years of study, Oppenheimer graduated from Harvard University in 1925. Oppenheimer received a doctors degree, in 1927, from the University of Gottingen in Germany. In Princeton New Jersey , Oppenheimer served as director of the Institute for Advanced Study.
Oppenheimer graduated from Harvard in three years with a Bachelor's degree in physics in 1925. Less than one year later, he published his first paper with the title On the Quantum Theory of Vibration-Rotation Bands. This was a study of frequencies and intensities of molecular band spectra derived from the new mechanics, discovered by Paul Adrian Maurice Dirac, Erwin Schroedinger, and Werner Karl Heisenberg. only in the previous year. Indeed, Oppenheimer was quick to pick up new ideas in theoretical physics.
In 1929, he accepted academic positions both at UC - Berkeley and at Cal Tech. From 1929 to 1942, he divided his time between the two institutions, and a list of his papers would show the trail of where he was at different times in his life. He had a keen sense for what was the next step that needed to be taken in nuclear physics.
He was also a great teacher; his infuence on his pupils was enhanced by his perceptive interest in people. It was this interest in personal relationships that helped him become a good leader for the Los Alamos National Laboratory.
In March 1943, Oppenheimer was assigned to the scientific directorship of the Los Alamos National Laboratory, but in reality, he had been working on this project for some time before this was official. When word came from Niels Bohr about nuclear fission, Oppenheimer started thinking about the practical release of nuclear energy
At that time in 1942, there were many universities in the United States that were working on the fission problem. Oppenheimer organized a conference in Berkeley attended by many first rate theoreticians, including Edward Teller, who, during the conference, first suggested the possibility of a nuclear bomb. A theoretical group led by by Oppenheimer proceeded to work on the potential of an atomic bomb.
When the United States government brought the atomic energy work under the auspices of the army and put General Leslie Groves (=> external link to Los Alamos National Laboratory) in charge of the project code-named the "Manhattan Project", Oppenheimer suggested to Groves that work on the project take place in a single laboratory. He knew that having the dispersion of scientists hampered the speed of work. The workers, including all of the theoretical physicists,
as well as the chemical engineers, metallurgists, and all of the other support personnel should be grouped together in one facility. Groves accepted the proposal, and on Oppenheimer's advice, chose the site of a former boy's boarding school in Los Alamos, New Mexico. The remoteness of the site increased the security of the project. Groves named Oppenheimer the facility's scientific director. None of this work was public knowledge until the first bomb was dropped on Hiroshima on August 6, 1945. (Click here for more information about Groves and the report he made to President Truman.
Oppenheimer was one of a panel of four scientists who, in May 1945, discussed the case for the military use of the atomic bomb on Japan. The other men on the panel were A. H. Compton, Enrico Fermi, and E. O. Lawrence. Their opinion, which Oppenheimer supported, was that a demonstration of the bomb on a deserted island would not be effective, and that the only way to end the war was to use it on a real military target in a populated area.
Oppenheimer later commented in 1962, "I believe there was very little deliberation....The actual military plans at the time... were clearly much more terrible in every way and for everyone concerned than the use of the bomb. Nevertheless, my own feeling is that if the bombs were to be used there could have been more effective warning and much less wanton killing... " (from Dictionary of Scientific Biography, Charles Scribner's Sons, New York, 1971. Vol. 10, p. 216). The implications of the decision to drop the bomb will continue to be studied by historians for years to come.
In 1946, the Atomic Energy Commission was established under the McMahon Act, which provided for civilian control of atomic energy. The commission appointed Oppenheimer as chairman of the General Advisory Committee, and he served in this capacity until 1952. The committee did more than just give technical advice; it had great influence on the policy of the commission. Oppenheimer's role on the committee was to clarify and formulate ideas. He served on numerous committees concerned with policy questions relating to atomic weapons
and defense.
Oppenheimer's loyalty to the United States was called into question before the Gray Board in April of 1954. There were allegations that he was a communist because of his activities in the 1930s. In actuality, he was being questioned because he lacked enthusiasm for the development of the hydrogen bomb. It must be remembered that these allegations were made during the time of hysterical fear of communists in the Joseph McCarthy era. Further, Oppenheimer had many enemies who were delighted at this opportunity to curb his influence. Some of these enemies were people that he had bested in scientific debates, and others were people interested in military policy who feared his influence. As a result of the Gary Board hearings, Oppenheimer lost his security clearance.
In 1963, however, Oppenheimer was vindicated when he received the prestigious Enrico Fermi Award, the highest prize awarded by the Atomic Energy Commission, conferred by President Johnson. Oppenheimer replied to President Johnson after receiving the award, "I think it is just possible...that it has taken some charity and some courage for you to make this award today" (from Dictionary of Scientific Biography, Charles Scribner's Sons, New York, 1971. Vol. 10, p. 218).
Richard Feynman
Richard Feynman was born May 11, 1918 in Queens New York, where he and his family lived in a modest middle-class neighborhood. By the age of fifteen, Feynman had already learned and mastered differential and integral calculus. He was accepted into MIT in 1936 and there he acceled in physics and other scientific subjects. He went on to Princeton as a Graduate but when the Manhattan project began he was asked, at the age of 24, to join the Los Alamos theoretical division. But before going he married his high school sweetheart, Arlene Greenbaum, who was sick with tuberculosis. When Feynman joined the project, the head of the theoretical division, Hans Bethe (pronounced bay-tah) became somewhat of a mentor to Feynman, and the two developed a long lasting friendship. Feynman and Bethe were a good team; Feynman was fast, but made mistakes, and Bethe was slower because he double checked everything. One of Feynman's talents was his speed in solving equations in his head, and finding ways to take large and complex equations and split them into smaller and more manageable pieces. This was very useful with many of the massive formulas used in the project, but even the split up equations were time consuming. Another one of Feynman's tasks was to find the amount of fissionable material it would take for the bomb to explode. Feynman was not just a theoretical physicist at Los Alamos, he was also the life of the party at many of the social events, where he joked and made many friends.
When his wife died (of tuberculosis) and the project ended in 1945, Feynman experienced a depression, but he quickly got his mind working on other things. He went to work on his thesis with Hans Bethe, to solve the mysteries of Quantum Electro Dynamics. To help solve the incredibly complex equations, which took weeks for a computer to solve, Feynman invented "Feynman Diagrams" for theoretical physics, for which he won a Nobel prize in 1965. In 1950, Feynman began teaching at the California Institute of Technology and in 1952 he remarried. He took up painting soon after, which never made a lot of money for him, but he didn't care because it was just a hobby. He stayed out the public eye for many years until in 1985 when he was asked to help find out why the challenger spaceship had exploded. He surprised NASA and the nation when he explained the it was the faulty O- rings on the ship that caused the problem. In 1988 he died from a long bout with cancer.
Enrico Fermi
Enrico Fermi was born in Rome on September 29, 1901. He is best known for his contributions to nuclear physics and the development quantum theory.
In 1934, while professor of physics at the University of Rome, Fermi began experiments where he bombarded a variety of elements with neutrons. He discovered that slow moving neutrons were especially effective in producing radioactive atoms. Not realizing he had split the atom, Fermi announced what he thought were elements beyond uranium. He won the 1938 Nobel Prize for physics for his work on nuclear processes. Also in 1938 two German physicists, Lise Meitner and Otto Frisch performed a similar experiment where they split a uranium atom. They named the process of splitting atoms "nuclear fission."
In 1938 Fermi was forced to flee Italy to escape the Fascist regime of Benito Mussolini. He was one of a large group of intellectuals who fled other countries of Europe due to the rise of National Socialism (the Nazi Party) in Germany and Fascism in Italy. Fermi settled in the United States, and became professor of physics at Columbia University in 1939. He moved to the University of Chicago in 1942 where he developed the first atomic pile, and produced the first nuclear chain reaction. During World War II he became part of the team that developed the atomic bomb at Los Alamos, New Mexico. After the war he pioneered research on high energy particles.
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Joseph Coleman Carter III, Nick Heinle's grandfather, was born in Versailles, Kentucky, on September 28, 1910. Son of a gentleman farmer, he spent his childhood hunting and fishing, where he learned to appreciate nature. He went to the United States Naval Academy at the age of 18, then went on to Columbia University were he received a Masters Degree in Mechanical Engineering. He was asked to join the Manhattan Project while at Columbia, where he worked under the direction of General Leslie Groves. During this time he and other engineers built a pilot version of the atomic bomb. One year later he and his new wife, Mary Leaphart, moved to Oak Ridge, Tennessee, where he worked on refining isotopes of uranium, and started work on designing nuclear submarines for the government. After leaving Oak Ridge, he went on to work for Argonne, a government lab, there he worked on development of the nuclear breeder reactor, which was designed to reuse spent fuel. In 1976, he returned to his old
Kentucky home, in Versailles, where he managed a farm and taught nuclear physics at the University of Kentucky. On June 26, 1992, he passed away after having a stroke.
Julius Robert Oppenheimer
J(ulius) Robert Oppenheimer was known as the father of the atomic bomb. From 1943 to 1945 he directed a laboratory at Los Alamos, where the designing and building (of the atomic bomb) took place. In 1947 to 1952 he headed the newly formed United States Atomic Energy Commission's advisory committee, and advised the U.S. Department of Defense. He also helped write the very 1st U.S. proposal for international control of nuclear energy! The AEC gave J. Robert Oppenheimer the highest honor it could give, the Enrico Fermi Award! After three years of study, Oppenheimer graduated from Harvard University in 1925. Oppenheimer received a doctors degree, in 1927, from the University of Gottingen in Germany. In Princeton New Jersey , Oppenheimer served as director of the Institute for Advanced Study.
Oppenheimer graduated from Harvard in three years with a Bachelor's degree in physics in 1925. Less than one year later, he published his first paper with the title On the Quantum Theory of Vibration-Rotation Bands. This was a study of frequencies and intensities of molecular band spectra derived from the new mechanics, discovered by Paul Adrian Maurice Dirac, Erwin Schroedinger, and Werner Karl Heisenberg. only in the previous year. Indeed, Oppenheimer was quick to pick up new ideas in theoretical physics.
In 1929, he accepted academic positions both at UC - Berkeley and at Cal Tech. From 1929 to 1942, he divided his time between the two institutions, and a list of his papers would show the trail of where he was at different times in his life. He had a keen sense for what was the next step that needed to be taken in nuclear physics.
He was also a great teacher; his infuence on his pupils was enhanced by his perceptive interest in people. It was this interest in personal relationships that helped him become a good leader for the Los Alamos National Laboratory.
In March 1943, Oppenheimer was assigned to the scientific directorship of the Los Alamos National Laboratory, but in reality, he had been working on this project for some time before this was official. When word came from Niels Bohr about nuclear fission, Oppenheimer started thinking about the practical release of nuclear energy
At that time in 1942, there were many universities in the United States that were working on the fission problem. Oppenheimer organized a conference in Berkeley attended by many first rate theoreticians, including Edward Teller, who, during the conference, first suggested the possibility of a nuclear bomb. A theoretical group led by by Oppenheimer proceeded to work on the potential of an atomic bomb.
When the United States government brought the atomic energy work under the auspices of the army and put General Leslie Groves (=> external link to Los Alamos National Laboratory) in charge of the project code-named the "Manhattan Project", Oppenheimer suggested to Groves that work on the project take place in a single laboratory. He knew that having the dispersion of scientists hampered the speed of work. The workers, including all of the theoretical physicists,
as well as the chemical engineers, metallurgists, and all of the other support personnel should be grouped together in one facility. Groves accepted the proposal, and on Oppenheimer's advice, chose the site of a former boy's boarding school in Los Alamos, New Mexico. The remoteness of the site increased the security of the project. Groves named Oppenheimer the facility's scientific director. None of this work was public knowledge until the first bomb was dropped on Hiroshima on August 6, 1945. (Click here for more information about Groves and the report he made to President Truman.
Oppenheimer was one of a panel of four scientists who, in May 1945, discussed the case for the military use of the atomic bomb on Japan. The other men on the panel were A. H. Compton, Enrico Fermi, and E. O. Lawrence. Their opinion, which Oppenheimer supported, was that a demonstration of the bomb on a deserted island would not be effective, and that the only way to end the war was to use it on a real military target in a populated area.
Oppenheimer later commented in 1962, "I believe there was very little deliberation....The actual military plans at the time... were clearly much more terrible in every way and for everyone concerned than the use of the bomb. Nevertheless, my own feeling is that if the bombs were to be used there could have been more effective warning and much less wanton killing... " (from Dictionary of Scientific Biography, Charles Scribner's Sons, New York, 1971. Vol. 10, p. 216). The implications of the decision to drop the bomb will continue to be studied by historians for years to come.
In 1946, the Atomic Energy Commission was established under the McMahon Act, which provided for civilian control of atomic energy. The commission appointed Oppenheimer as chairman of the General Advisory Committee, and he served in this capacity until 1952. The committee did more than just give technical advice; it had great influence on the policy of the commission. Oppenheimer's role on the committee was to clarify and formulate ideas. He served on numerous committees concerned with policy questions relating to atomic weapons
and defense.
Oppenheimer's loyalty to the United States was called into question before the Gray Board in April of 1954. There were allegations that he was a communist because of his activities in the 1930s. In actuality, he was being questioned because he lacked enthusiasm for the development of the hydrogen bomb. It must be remembered that these allegations were made during the time of hysterical fear of communists in the Joseph McCarthy era. Further, Oppenheimer had many enemies who were delighted at this opportunity to curb his influence. Some of these enemies were people that he had bested in scientific debates, and others were people interested in military policy who feared his influence. As a result of the Gary Board hearings, Oppenheimer lost his security clearance.
In 1963, however, Oppenheimer was vindicated when he received the prestigious Enrico Fermi Award, the highest prize awarded by the Atomic Energy Commission, conferred by President Johnson. Oppenheimer replied to President Johnson after receiving the award, "I think it is just possible...that it has taken some charity and some courage for you to make this award today" (from Dictionary of Scientific Biography, Charles Scribner's Sons, New York, 1971. Vol. 10, p. 218).
Richard Feynman
Richard Feynman was born May 11, 1918 in Queens New York, where he and his family lived in a modest middle-class neighborhood. By the age of fifteen, Feynman had already learned and mastered differential and integral calculus. He was accepted into MIT in 1936 and there he acceled in physics and other scientific subjects. He went on to Princeton as a Graduate but when the Manhattan project began he was asked, at the age of 24, to join the Los Alamos theoretical division. But before going he married his high school sweetheart, Arlene Greenbaum, who was sick with tuberculosis. When Feynman joined the project, the head of the theoretical division, Hans Bethe (pronounced bay-tah) became somewhat of a mentor to Feynman, and the two developed a long lasting friendship. Feynman and Bethe were a good team; Feynman was fast, but made mistakes, and Bethe was slower because he double checked everything. One of Feynman's talents was his speed in solving equations in his head, and finding ways to take large and complex equations and split them into smaller and more manageable pieces. This was very useful with many of the massive formulas used in the project, but even the split up equations were time consuming. Another one of Feynman's tasks was to find the amount of fissionable material it would take for the bomb to explode. Feynman was not just a theoretical physicist at Los Alamos, he was also the life of the party at many of the social events, where he joked and made many friends.
When his wife died (of tuberculosis) and the project ended in 1945, Feynman experienced a depression, but he quickly got his mind working on other things. He went to work on his thesis with Hans Bethe, to solve the mysteries of Quantum Electro Dynamics. To help solve the incredibly complex equations, which took weeks for a computer to solve, Feynman invented "Feynman Diagrams" for theoretical physics, for which he won a Nobel prize in 1965. In 1950, Feynman began teaching at the California Institute of Technology and in 1952 he remarried. He took up painting soon after, which never made a lot of money for him, but he didn't care because it was just a hobby. He stayed out the public eye for many years until in 1985 when he was asked to help find out why the challenger spaceship had exploded. He surprised NASA and the nation when he explained the it was the faulty O- rings on the ship that caused the problem. In 1988 he died from a long bout with cancer.
Enrico Fermi
Enrico Fermi was born in Rome on September 29, 1901. He is best known for his contributions to nuclear physics and the development quantum theory.
In 1934, while professor of physics at the University of Rome, Fermi began experiments where he bombarded a variety of elements with neutrons. He discovered that slow moving neutrons were especially effective in producing radioactive atoms. Not realizing he had split the atom, Fermi announced what he thought were elements beyond uranium. He won the 1938 Nobel Prize for physics for his work on nuclear processes. Also in 1938 two German physicists, Lise Meitner and Otto Frisch performed a similar experiment where they split a uranium atom. They named the process of splitting atoms "nuclear fission."
In 1938 Fermi was forced to flee Italy to escape the Fascist regime of Benito Mussolini. He was one of a large group of intellectuals who fled other countries of Europe due to the rise of National Socialism (the Nazi Party) in Germany and Fascism in Italy. Fermi settled in the United States, and became professor of physics at Columbia University in 1939. He moved to the University of Chicago in 1942 where he developed the first atomic pile, and produced the first nuclear chain reaction. During World War II he became part of the team that developed the atomic bomb at Los Alamos, New Mexico. After the war he pioneered research on high energy particles.
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