Enrico Fermi

Enrico Fermi was a brilliant physicist who raised the question in during a social gathering in Los Alamos, New Mexico in 1943. Virtually everyone has asked this question at some point in their lives, wondering if we are alone in the universe. This has come to be known as “The Fermi Paradox”. The Fermi Paradox, although it predates the Drake Equation, exists because of the odds of alien life the equation…

the project was successful (Manhattan). The explosion was equal about 18,000 tons of TNT (America). Robert J. Oppenheimer, David Bohm, Leo Szilard, Eugene Wigner, Otto Frisch, Rudolf Peierls, Felix Block, Niels Bohr, Eillo Segre, James Franck, Enrico Fermi, Klaus Fuchs, and Edward Teller are all people who worked on the bomb (Atomic Bomb). There was many more people who built the bomb but there was too many to name. In 1950, Niels Bohr pleaded to the U.N. to help create a world free of atomic…

The Multiverse Theory is one of the most talked about theories in the modern age. It entails how there is a chance that we are not the only universe in existence but rather there are tens of thousands of other universes. This leaves all kinds of possibilities to the imagination; maybe someone was born with red hair rather than blonde, maybe someone became president rather than a physics professor. There are an infinite number of possibilities which causes the Multiverse Theory to also be a…

The term “nuclear engineering” often denotes connotation of war derived from the use of atomic bombs at the end of World War Two. Wartime often heavily influences the intention of research and World War Two was no different. Although, outside of war, nuclear engineering’s emphasis is as a source of power. With the turn of the 21st century, realization of increasing energy demands, awareness of the importance of energy security, and concerns about global warming have surfaced. With such…

decision to make only a few months after, later learning of America’s dark secret, the Manhattan Project. The Manhattan Project was the manifestation of an atomic bomb discovered by German physicists splitting a uranium atom. Albert Einstein and Enrico Fermi, who escaped execution from knowing these potential dangers, informed the president of the United States of what the Germans have learned. In 1941, scientists worked together to build an atomic bomb which later received the name, the…

attack on Nazi Germany. Albert Einstein alerted the American government that the Germans were developing atomic weapons and soon the Manhattan Project began. Robert Oppenheimer was in charge of the project to build an atomic bomb to counter Germany. Enrico Fermi designed the first successful nuclear reactor in 1939 and created it in 1942 at the University of Chicago as part of the project. On July 16, 1945 they detonated the world’s first atomic bomb in New Mexico. A month later, on August 6,…

Origination and Initiation of the Manhattan Project The development of atomic bomb in the United States started in 1939 when a small number of physicists were alarmed over the possibility of Germany successfully developing an atomic bomb and warned President Roosevelt. Einstein and Szilard wrote a letter on their proposal about atomic bombs and was delivered to the President's aide, General Edwin Watson, by Alexander Sachs, an economist and writer who had a friendly relationship with Roosevelt.…

Following a major earthquake, a 15-metre tsunami disabled the power supply and cooling of three Fukushima Daiichi reactors, causing a nuclear accident on March 11th 2011 that would reintroduce to the world the question of “Should the use of nuclear energy continue?” Fukushima and many other critical junctures since the start of the first nuclear reactor in Idaho, in December 1951, have influenced changing attitudes towards nuclear energy throughout time. Nuclear power is one of the primary…

American forces alone." (Walker 3) If an important leader such as the Secretary of War is recommending the use of the bomb, it becomes clear that it was necessary to use on Japan. According to the Scientific Panel in June of 1945 composed of Oppenheimer, Fermi, Compton and Lawrence, they found that there was no “acceptable alternative to direct military use” of the bomb. These were some of the most brilliant minds existing in America at the time, discluding the much accredited Albert Einstein.…

allowed to explore their possibilities without stressing their financial and social status. The competition between the nations and the contests of experiments and researches brought radical advancement of the technology. In December 1942, Italian Enrico Fermi succeeded to produce a controlled chain reaction in Chicago (“Manhattan Project”). While its study, a highly fissionable element, Plutonium were created. From the extraction of U-235 from U-238, Scientists found that Uranium 238 were able…