Harrison Brown
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Harrison Scott Brown (September 26, 1917 – December 8, 1986) was an American
nuclear chemist Nuclear chemistry is the sub-field of chemistry dealing with radioactivity, nuclear processes, and transformations in the nuclei of atoms, such as nuclear transmutation and nuclear properties. It is the chemistry of radioactive elements such as ...
and
geochemist Geochemistry is the science that uses the tools and principles of chemistry to explain the mechanisms behind major geological systems such as the Earth's crust and its oceans. The realm of geochemistry extends beyond the Earth, encompassing the ...
. He was a political activist, who lectured and wrote on the issues of arms limitation, natural resources and world hunger. During
World War II World War II or the Second World War, often abbreviated as WWII or WW2, was a world war that lasted from 1939 to 1945. It involved the vast majority of the world's countries—including all of the great powers—forming two opposin ...
, Brown worked at the
Manhattan Project The Manhattan Project was a research and development undertaking during World War II that produced the first nuclear weapons. It was led by the United States with the support of the United Kingdom and Canada. From 1942 to 1946, the project w ...
's
Metallurgical Laboratory The Metallurgical Laboratory (or Met Lab) was a scientific laboratory at the University of Chicago that was established in February 1942 to study and use the newly discovered chemical element plutonium. It researched plutonium's chemistry and m ...
and
Clinton Engineer Works The Clinton Engineer Works (CEW) was the production installation of the Manhattan Project that during World War II produced the enriched uranium used in the 1945 bombing of Hiroshima, as well as the first examples of reactor-produced plutoni ...
, where he worked on ways to separate
plutonium Plutonium is a radioactive chemical element with the symbol Pu and atomic number 94. It is an actinide metal of silvery-gray appearance that tarnishes when exposed to air, and forms a dull coating when oxidized. The element normally exhibi ...
from
uranium Uranium is a chemical element with the symbol U and atomic number 92. It is a silvery-grey metal in the actinide series of the periodic table. A uranium atom has 92 protons and 92 electrons, of which 6 are valence electrons. Uranium is weak ...
. The techniques he helped develop were used at the
Hanford Site The Hanford Site is a decommissioned nuclear production complex operated by the United States federal government on the Columbia River in Benton County in the U.S. state of Washington. The site has been known by many names, including SiteW a ...
to produce the plutonium used in the
Fat Man "Fat Man" (also known as Mark III) is the codename for the type of nuclear bomb the United States detonated over the Japanese city of Nagasaki on 9 August 1945. It was the second of the only two nuclear weapons ever used in warfare, the fir ...
bomb dropped on Nagasaki. After the war he lectured on the dangers of nuclear weapons. After the war, he worked at the University of Chicago, where he pioneered
nuclear geochemistry Nuclear may refer to: Physics Relating to the nucleus of the atom: *Nuclear engineering *Nuclear physics *Nuclear power *Nuclear reactor *Nuclear weapon *Nuclear medicine *Radiation therapy *Nuclear warfare Mathematics *Nuclear space *Nuclear ...
. The study of
meteorites A meteorite is a solid piece of debris from an object, such as a comet, asteroid, or meteoroid, that originates in outer space and survives its passage through the atmosphere to reach the surface of a planet or moon. When the original object en ...
by Brown and his students led to the first close approximation of the
age of the Earth The age of Earth is estimated to be 4.54 ± 0.05 billion years This age may represent the age of Earth's accretion, or core formation, or of the material from which Earth formed. This dating is based on evidence from radiometric age-dating of ...
and the solar system. Between 1951 and 1977, he worked at the
California Institute of Technology The California Institute of Technology (branded as Caltech or CIT)The university itself only spells its short form as "Caltech"; the institution considers other spellings such a"Cal Tech" and "CalTech" incorrect. The institute is also occasional ...
(Caltech) where he contributed to advances in telescopic instrumentation, jet propulsion, and
infrared astronomy Infrared astronomy is a sub-discipline of astronomy which specializes in the observation and analysis of astronomical objects using infrared (IR) radiation. The wavelength of infrared light ranges from 0.75 to 300 micrometers, and falls in betwee ...
. In the early 1970s, he began working more directly on the resource/environment issues that he had been developing in his books. In 1977, he became director of the newly created Resource Systems Institute of the East-West Center in Hawaii where he turned full time to work on understanding and influencing the interactions of energy, mineral, and food systems in the Asia-Pacific Region, themes he had developed in his books since the 1950s.


Manhattan Project

In 1942
Glenn T. Seaborg Glenn Theodore Seaborg (; April 19, 1912February 25, 1999) was an American chemist whose involvement in the synthesis, discovery and investigation of ten transuranium elements earned him a share of the 1951 Nobel Prize in Chemistry. His work in ...
invited Brown to work with him at the
University of Chicago The University of Chicago (UChicago, Chicago, U of C, or UChi) is a private research university in Chicago, Illinois. Its main campus is located in Chicago's Hyde Park neighborhood. The University of Chicago is consistently ranked among the b ...
in the Manhattan Project's
Metallurgical Laboratory The Metallurgical Laboratory (or Met Lab) was a scientific laboratory at the University of Chicago that was established in February 1942 to study and use the newly discovered chemical element plutonium. It researched plutonium's chemistry and m ...
, working on ways to separate
plutonium Plutonium is a radioactive chemical element with the symbol Pu and atomic number 94. It is an actinide metal of silvery-gray appearance that tarnishes when exposed to air, and forms a dull coating when oxidized. The element normally exhibi ...
from
uranium Uranium is a chemical element with the symbol U and atomic number 92. It is a silvery-grey metal in the actinide series of the periodic table. A uranium atom has 92 protons and 92 electrons, of which 6 are valence electrons. Uranium is weak ...
. The Manhattan Project intended to create plutonium by irradiating uranium in a
nuclear reactor A nuclear reactor is a device used to initiate and control a fission nuclear chain reaction or nuclear fusion reactions. Nuclear reactors are used at nuclear power plants for electricity generation and in nuclear marine propulsion. Heat from nu ...
. The resulting highly radioactive product would then have to be chemically separated from the uranium and any
fission products Nuclear fission products are the atomic fragments left after a large atomic nucleus undergoes nuclear fission. Typically, a large nucleus like that of uranium fissions by splitting into two smaller nuclei, along with a few neutrons, the release ...
created by the irradiation process. The problem was that plutonium was a new element with chemical properties that were not yet fully known. Until a reactor could be built, it was available only in microgram amount, so an industrial separation process would have to be scaled up one billion times. With Orville Hill, Brown devised a successful method of achieving this by using the gaseous evaporation of
fluoride Fluoride (). According to this source, is a possible pronunciation in British English. is an inorganic, monatomic anion of fluorine, with the chemical formula (also written ), whose salts are typically white or colorless. Fluoride salts typ ...
s. Brown and some of his colleagues to the
Oak Ridge, Tennessee Oak Ridge is a city in Anderson and Roane counties in the eastern part of the U.S. state of Tennessee, about west of downtown Knoxville. Oak Ridge's population was 31,402 at the 2020 census. It is part of the Knoxville Metropolitan Area. Oak ...
, to work with the X-10 Graphite Reactor at
Clinton Engineer Works The Clinton Engineer Works (CEW) was the production installation of the Manhattan Project that during World War II produced the enriched uranium used in the 1945 bombing of Hiroshima, as well as the first examples of reactor-produced plutoni ...
, where he became the assistant director of chemistry. Working with the reactor there, they developed the separation processes for producing kilogram quantities of plutonium. The techniques discovered by the team proved to be the groundwork for those used at the
Hanford Site The Hanford Site is a decommissioned nuclear production complex operated by the United States federal government on the Columbia River in Benton County in the U.S. state of Washington. The site has been known by many names, including SiteW a ...
which provided the plutonium for the
Fat Man "Fat Man" (also known as Mark III) is the codename for the type of nuclear bomb the United States detonated over the Japanese city of Nagasaki on 9 August 1945. It was the second of the only two nuclear weapons ever used in warfare, the fir ...
bomb dropped on Nagasaki on August 9, 1945. Just four months later he completed ''Must Destruction Be Our Destiny?'' (1945), a book detailing the dangers of
nuclear weapon 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 bom ...
s. He gave 102 lectures to promote the book, donating the royalties from the book to an organisation that later became part of the
Federation of American Scientists The Federation of American Scientists (FAS) is an American nonprofit global policy think tank with the stated intent of using science and scientific analysis to attempt to make the world more secure. FAS was founded in 1946 by scientists who wo ...
.


Later life

In 1946, Brown returned to the University of Chicago to work as an assistant professor of Chemistry in the Institute for Nuclear Studies. He was joined by some of his former colleagues from the Manhattan Project and together they became the first team to study
nuclear geochemistry Nuclear may refer to: Physics Relating to the nucleus of the atom: *Nuclear engineering *Nuclear physics *Nuclear power *Nuclear reactor *Nuclear weapon *Nuclear medicine *Radiation therapy *Nuclear warfare Mathematics *Nuclear space *Nuclear ...
. He went on to study
meteorite A meteorite is a solid piece of debris from an object, such as a comet, asteroid, or meteoroid, that originates in outer space and survives its passage through the atmosphere to reach the surface of a planet or Natural satellite, moon. When the ...
s and planetary structures along with ways to date the
age of the Earth The age of Earth is estimated to be 4.54 ± 0.05 billion years This age may represent the age of Earth's accretion, or core formation, or of the material from which Earth formed. This dating is based on evidence from radiometric age-dating of ...
, encouraging George Tilton and
Clair Patterson Clair Cameron Patterson (June 2, 1922 – December 5, 1995) was an American geochemist. Born in Mitchellville, Iowa, Patterson graduated from Grinnell College. He later received his Ph.D. from the University of Chicago and spent his entire profe ...
to investigate the isotopic composition of iron
meteorite A meteorite is a solid piece of debris from an object, such as a comet, asteroid, or meteoroid, that originates in outer space and survives its passage through the atmosphere to reach the surface of a planet or Natural satellite, moon. When the ...
s. Patterson's studies of
lead Lead is a chemical element with the symbol Pb (from the Latin ) and atomic number 82. It is a heavy metal that is denser than most common materials. Lead is soft and malleable, and also has a relatively low melting point. When freshly cu ...
eventually led to the first close approximation of the age of the Earth and the solar system of 4.5 billion years. Another of his doctoral students,
Edward D. Goldberg Edward David Goldberg (August 2, 1921 – March 7, 2008) was a marine chemist, known for his studies of pollution in the oceans. Biography Goldberg was born on August 2, 1921, in Sacramento, California. He received his B.S. in chemistry from t ...
, measured trace occurrences of
gallium Gallium is a chemical element with the symbol Ga and atomic number 31. Discovered by French chemist Paul-Émile Lecoq de Boisbaudran in 1875, Gallium is in group 13 of the periodic table and is similar to the other metals of the group (aluminiu ...
,
gold Gold is a chemical element with the symbol Au (from la, aurum) and atomic number 79. This makes it one of the higher atomic number elements that occur naturally. It is a bright, slightly orange-yellow, dense, soft, malleable, and ductile met ...
,
palladium Palladium is a chemical element with the symbol Pd and atomic number 46. It is a rare and lustrous silvery-white metal discovered in 1803 by the English chemist William Hyde Wollaston. He named it after the asteroid Pallas, which was itself na ...
, and
rhenium Rhenium is a chemical element with the symbol Re and atomic number 75. It is a silvery-gray, heavy, third-row transition metal in group 7 of the periodic table. With an estimated average concentration of 1 part per billion (ppb), rhenium is one ...
in meteorites, he was able to group iron meteorites based on their geochemical composition. In 1948 Brown was awarded the
American Association for the Advancement of Science The American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS) is an American international non-profit organization with the stated goals of promoting cooperation among scientists, defending scientific freedom, encouraging scientific respons ...
prize for his work on meteorites. Between 1951 and 1977, Brown was professor of geochemistry at the
California Institute of Technology The California Institute of Technology (branded as Caltech or CIT)The university itself only spells its short form as "Caltech"; the institution considers other spellings such a"Cal Tech" and "CalTech" incorrect. The institute is also occasional ...
(Caltech). While there he attracted several former colleagues and highly regarded scientists to the team. Together they made advancements in telescopic instrumentation, jet propulsion (contributing to
NASA The National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA ) is an independent agency of the US federal government responsible for the civil space program, aeronautics research, and space research. NASA was established in 1958, succeeding t ...
's early planetary exploration missions), and
infrared astronomy Infrared astronomy is a sub-discipline of astronomy which specializes in the observation and analysis of astronomical objects using infrared (IR) radiation. The wavelength of infrared light ranges from 0.75 to 300 micrometers, and falls in betwee ...
. In June 1954 he was one of twenty scientists under the age of forty identified by ''
Fortune Magazine ''Fortune'' is an American multinational business magazine headquartered in New York City. It is published by Fortune Media Group Holdings, owned by Thai businessman Chatchaval Jiaravanon. The publication was founded by Henry Luce in 1929. The ...
'' as "top young scientists in U. S. universities and industry". Brown was elected to the
National Academy of Sciences The National Academy of Sciences (NAS) is a United States nonprofit, non-governmental organization. NAS is part of the National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine, along with the National Academy of Engineering (NAE) and the Nati ...
in 1955 and was appointed as their foreign secretary in January 1962, a role that he would hold until 1974. He was later elected a member of both the
American Academy of Arts and Sciences The American Academy of Arts and Sciences (abbreviation: AAA&S) is one of the oldest learned societies in the United States. It was founded in 1780 during the American Revolution by John Adams, John Hancock, James Bowdoin, Andrew Oliver, and ...
and the
American Philosophical Society The American Philosophical Society (APS), founded in 1743 in Philadelphia, is a scholarly organization that promotes knowledge in the sciences and humanities through research, professional meetings, publications, library resources, and communit ...
. He demonstrated an interest in the scientific interactions between the United States and Eastern Europe. Len Ackland noted that "Geochemistry and his travels in developing countries caused him to ponder the adequacy of the Earth's resources and the problems of development, hunger and population growth." These were themes that he would expound on in his next three books: ''The Challenge of Man's Future'' (1954), ''The Next Hundred Years'' (1957) and ''The Human Future Revisited'' (1978). He also wrote a science fiction novel, ''The Cassiopeia Affair'' with Chloe Zerwick. He divorced Adele and married Rudd Owen, who collaborated with him on his writings and social activism. "Man has it within his power today," he said in 1976, "to create a world in which people the world over can lead free and abundant and even creative lives. I am convinced that we can create a world which will pale the Golden Age of Pericles into nothingness." In the early 1970s, he began focusing more on the issues he had developed in his books, including working with a post-doctorate fellow, John P. Holdren, who later became President
Barack Obama Barack Hussein Obama II ( ; born August 4, 1961) is an American politician who served as the 44th president of the United States from 2009 to 2017. A member of the Democratic Party, Obama was the first African-American president of the U ...
's Science Advisor (2009-2017). Brown was appointed first director of the Resource System Institute at the
East–West Center The East–West Center (EWC), or the Center for Cultural and Technical Interchange Between East and West, is an education and research organization established by the U.S. Congress in 1960 to strengthen relations and understanding among the peopl ...
(EWC) in Honolulu. Located adjacent to the
University of Hawaii A university () is an institution of higher (or tertiary) education and research which awards academic degrees in several academic disciplines. Universities typically offer both undergraduate and postgraduate programs. In the United States, th ...
campus in Manoa, the EWC was a research and educational institution focused on problems in the Asia-Pacific Region. He put together a team of scientists from across the US to follow through even more directly on the ideas he developed in his books, i.e. to explore the sustainability of energy, minerals, and food systems and how they interacted with population and environment. In 1983, in failing health, Brown retired and moved to
Albuquerque, New Mexico Albuquerque ( ; ), ; kee, Arawageeki; tow, Vakêêke; zun, Alo:ke:k'ya; apj, Gołgéeki'yé. abbreviated ABQ, is the most populous city in the U.S. state of New Mexico. Its nicknames, The Duke City and Burque, both reference its founding in ...
with his third wife, Theresa Tellez, his second marriage having also ended in divorce. He became a regular columnist and editor-in-chief of the
Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists The ''Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists'' is a nonprofit organization concerning science and global security issues resulting from accelerating technological advances that have negative consequences for humanity. The ''Bulletin'' publishes conte ...
. In his last years, Brown battled lung cancer, the treatment for which had resulted in progressive paralysis through the irradiation of his spine. He died in the
University of New Mexico Hospital The University of New Mexico Hospital (locally known as either University Hospital, UNM Hospital, or shortened to UNMH) is a public teaching hospital located in Albuquerque, New Mexico, immediately north of the main campus of the University of New ...
in Albuquerque on December 8, 1986. He was survived by his third wife Theresa and his son Eric.


Selected publications

*''Must Destruction Be Our Destiny?'' (1945) *''The Challenge of Man's Future'' (1954) *''The Next Hundred Years'' (1957) *''The Cassiopeia Affair'' with Chloe Zerwick (1968) *''The Human Future Revisited'' (1978)


References


External links

* {{DEFAULTSORT:Brown, Harrison Scott 1917 births 1986 deaths People from Sheridan, Wyoming Johns Hopkins University alumni University of Chicago faculty 20th-century American physicists American geochemists Members of the United States National Academy of Sciences Manhattan Project people Members of the American Philosophical Society