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J. R. Oppenheimer
J. Robert Oppenheimer (; April 22, 1904 – February 18, 1967) was an American theoretical physics, theoretical physicist. A professor of physics at the University of California, Berkeley, Oppenheimer was the wartime head of the Los Alamos Laboratory and is often credited as the "father of the atomic bomb" for his role in the Manhattan Project—the World War II undertaking that developed the first nuclear weapons. Oppenheimer was among those who observed the Trinity test in New Mexico, where the first atomic bomb was successfully detonated on July 16, 1945. He later remarked that the explosion brought to mind words from the ''Bhagavad Gita'': "Now I am become Death, the destroyer of worlds." In August 1945, the weapons were used in the atomic bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki. After the war ended, Oppenheimer became chairman of the influential General Advisory Committee of the newly created United States Atomic Energy Commission. He used that position to lobby for internation ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Princeton, New Jersey
Princeton is a municipality with a borough form of government in Mercer County, in the U.S. state of New Jersey. It was established on January 1, 2013, through the consolidation of the Borough of Princeton and Princeton Township, both of which are now defunct. Centrally located within the Raritan Valley region, Princeton is a regional commercial hub for the Central New Jersey region and a commuter town in the New York metropolitan area.New York-Newark, NY-NJ-CT-PA Combined Statistical Area . Accessed December 5, 2020. As of the |
Philip Morrison
Philip Morrison (November 7, 1915 – April 22, 2005) was a professor of physics at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT). He is known for his work on the Manhattan Project during World War II, and for his later work in quantum physics, nuclear physics high energy astrophysics, and SETI. A graduate of Carnegie Tech, Morrison became interested in physics, which he studied at the University of California, Berkeley, under the supervision of J. Robert Oppenheimer. He also joined the Communist Party. During World War II he joined the Manhattan Project's Metallurgical Laboratory at the University of Chicago, where he worked with Eugene Wigner on the design of nuclear reactors. In 1944 he moved to the Manhattan Project's Los Alamos Laboratory in New Mexico, where he worked with George Kistiakowsky on the development of explosive lenses required to detonate the implosion-type nuclear weapon. Morrison transported the core of the Trinity test device to the test site in the bac ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Peter Goodchild
Peter Goodchild CChem FRSC (born 18 August 1939)Debrett's is a former BBC television editor, who notably edited ''Horizon'' and who initiated the popular 1980s BBC science series '' Q.E.D.''. Early life He studied at St John's College, Oxford. Before Oxford, he was a student at Aldenham, located near Elstree, Herts.Career BBC He joined the BBC's '' Horizon'', becoming a producer from 1965-69.[...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Frank Oppenheimer
Frank Friedman Oppenheimer (August 14, 1912 – February 3, 1985) was an American particle physicist, cattle rancher, professor of physics at the University of Colorado, and the founder of the Exploratorium in San Francisco. A younger brother of renowned physicist J. Robert Oppenheimer, Frank Oppenheimer conducted research on aspects of nuclear physics during the time of the Manhattan Project, and made contributions to uranium enrichment. After the war, Oppenheimer's earlier involvement with the American Communist Party placed him under scrutiny, and he resigned from his physics position at the University of Minnesota. Oppenheimer was a target of McCarthyism and was blacklisted from finding any physics teaching position in the United States until 1957, when he was allowed to teach science at a high school in Colorado. This rehabilitation allowed him to gain a position at the University of Colorado teaching physics. In 1969, Oppenheimer founded the Exploratorium in San Francisco ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Katherine Oppenheimer
Katherine "Kitty" Oppenheimer ( Puening; August 8, 1910 – October 27, 1972) was a German American biologist, botanist, and a member of the Communist Party of America. She is best known as the common-law wife of activist Joe Dallet, and then the wife of physicist J. Robert Oppenheimer, the director of the Manhattan Project's Los Alamos Laboratory during World War II. Early life Katherine "Kitty" Vissering Puening was born in Recklinghausen, Westphalia, Prussia, Germany, on August 8, 1910, the only child of Franz Puening and his wife Käthe Vissering. Although she claimed that her father was a prince and that her mother was related to Queen Victoria, this was untrue. Her mother was a cousin of Wilhelm Keitel, who later became a field marshal in the German Army during World War II, and was hanged in 1946. Puening arrived in the United States on May 14, 1913, aboard the SS ''Kaiser Wilhelm der Grosse''. Her father, a metallurgical engineer, had invented a new kind of blast ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Enrico Fermi Award
The Enrico Fermi Award is a scientific award conferred by the President of the United States. It is awarded to honor scientists of international stature for their lifetime achievement in the development, use, or production of energy. It was established in 1956 by the United States Department of Energy in memorial of Italian-American physicist Enrico Fermi and his work in the development of nuclear power. The recipient of the award receives $100,000, a certificate signed by the President and the Secretary of Energy, and a gold medal featuring the likeness of Enrico Fermi. Previous winners SourceUS Department of Energy See also * List of engineering awards * Prizes named after people * List of things named after Enrico Fermi * Vannevar Bush Award The National Science Board established the Vannevar Bush Award ( ) in 1980 to honor Vannevar Bush's unique contributions to public service. The annual award recognizes an individual who, through public service activities in science ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Born–Oppenheimer Approximation
In quantum chemistry and molecular physics, the Born–Oppenheimer (BO) approximation is the best-known mathematical approximation in molecular dynamics. Specifically, it is the assumption that the wave functions of atomic nuclei and electrons in a molecule can be treated separately, based on the fact that the nuclei are much heavier than the electrons. Due to the larger relative mass of a nucleus compared to an electron, the coordinates of the nuclei in a system are approximated as fixed, while the coordinates of the electrons are dynamic. The approach is named after Max Born and J. Robert Oppenheimer who proposed it in 1927, in the early period of quantum mechanics. The approximation is widely used in quantum chemistry to speed up the computation of molecular wavefunctions and other properties for large molecules. There are cases where the assumption of separable motion no longer holds, which make the approximation lose validity (it is said to "break down"), but even then t ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Oppenheimer–Phillips Process
The Oppenheimer–Phillips process or strip reaction is a type of deuteron-induced nuclear reaction. In this process the neutron half of an energetic deuteron (a stable isotope of hydrogen with one proton and one neutron) fuses with a target nucleus, transmuting the target to a heavier isotope while ejecting a proton. An example is the nuclear transmutation of carbon-12 to carbon-13. The process allows a nuclear interaction to take place at lower energies than would be expected from a simple calculation of the Coulomb barrier between a deuteron and a target nucleus. This is because, as the deuteron approaches the positively charged target nucleus, it experiences a charge polarization where the "proton-end" faces away from the target and the "neutron-end" faces towards the target. The fusion proceeds when the binding energy of the neutron and the target nucleus exceeds the binding energy of the deuteron itself; the proton formerly in the deuteron is then repelled from the new, he ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Tolman–Oppenheimer–Volkoff Limit
The Tolman–Oppenheimer–Volkoff limit (or TOV limit) is an upper bound to the mass of cold, nonrotating neutron stars, analogous to the Chandrasekhar limit for white dwarf stars. If the mass of the said star reaches the limit it will collapse to a denser form. Theoretical work in 1996 placed the limit at approximately 1.5 to 3.0 solar masses, corresponding to an original stellar mass of 15 to 20 solar masses; additional work in the same year gave a more precise range of 2.2 to 2.9 solar masses. Observations of GW170817, the first gravitational wave event due to merging neutron stars (which are thought to have collapsed into a black hole within a few seconds after merging), placed the limit at close to 2.17 (solar masses). This value was inconsistent with short gamma-ray burst X-ray plateau data however, which suggested a value of ''M''TOV = 2.37 . Reanalysis of the GW170817 event data in 2019 resulted in a higher value of ''M''TOV = 2.3 . If GW ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Tolman–Oppenheimer–Volkoff Equation
In astrophysics, the Tolman–Oppenheimer–Volkoff (TOV) equation constrains the structure of a spherically symmetric body of isotropic material which is in static gravitational equilibrium, as modelled by general relativity. The equation is :\frac=-\frac\rho\left(1+\frac\right)\left(1+\frac\right)\left(1-\frac\right)^ Here, r is a radial coordinate, and \rho(r) and P(r) are the density and pressure, respectively, of the material at radius r. The quantity m(r), the total mass within r, is discussed below. The equation is derived by solving the Einstein equations for a general time-invariant, spherically symmetric metric. For a solution to the Tolman–Oppenheimer–Volkoff equation, this metric will take the form :ds^2=e^ c^2 \,dt^2 - \left(1-\frac\right)^ \,dr^2 - r^2\left(d\theta^2 + \sin^2 \theta \,d\phi^2\right) where \nu(r) is determined by the constraint :\frac=- \left(\frac \right) \frac When supplemented with an equation of state, F(\rho,P)=0, which relates den ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Nuclear Weapons
A nuclear weapon is an explosive device that derives its destructive force from nuclear reactions, either fission (fission bomb) or a combination of fission and fusion reactions (thermonuclear bomb), producing a nuclear explosion. Both bomb types release large quantities of energy from relatively small amounts of matter. The first test of a fission ("atomic") bomb released an amount of energy approximately equal to . The first thermonuclear ("hydrogen") bomb test released energy approximately equal to . Nuclear bombs have had yields between 10 tons TNT (the W54) and 50 megatons for the Tsar Bomba (see TNT equivalent). A thermonuclear weapon weighing as little as can release energy equal to more than . A nuclear device no larger than a conventional bomb can devastate an entire city by blast, fire, and radiation. Since they are weapons of mass destruction, the proliferation of nuclear weapons is a focus of international relations policy. Nuclear weapons have been deployed ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
George Volkoff
George Michael Volkoff, (February 23, 1914 – April 24, 2000) was a Russian-Canadian physicist and academic who helped, with J. Robert Oppenheimer, predict the existence of neutron stars before they were discovered. Early life He was born in Moscow. His father was a Russian engineer who emigrated to Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada in 1924. Unable to find work, his father moved the family to Harbin, Manchuria in 1927. His mother died soon after moving to Harbin. In 1936, Volkoff's father returned to Russia but was exiled to the arctic camps as part of the Great Purge where he would die. Education Volkoff returned to Vancouver and entered the University of British Columbia where he received a Bachelor of Arts in physics in 1934 and a Master of Arts degree in 1936. He then studied with J. Robert Oppenheimer at the University of California, Berkeley where he published his paper "On Massive Neutron Cores" and earned his Ph.D. in 1940. Academic In 1940, he joined the physic ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
