The Manhatten Project
During World War II when the war was about to break out in Europe, the United States first started looking at building an atomic bomb but the Germans were already two years ahead of the Americans. Anuclear bomb at the time would provide definite power to end the war. Albert Einstein was concerned that the Germans would develop and use nuclear weapons first. That prompted Einstein to write his letter to President Roosevelt on 2 August 1939. Einstein suggested that an enormously powerful weapon could be made with uranium as fuel, and proposed that a special team can explore this possibility. Roosevelt responded quickly and set up a study committee which reported back that Einstein's ideas were possible. Then the top secret Manhattan project was established headed by Robert Oppenheimer. Basically the aim of the project was to produce the world's first nuclear fission powered weapons. There were a few possibilities for the construction of the bomb. Uranium which consisted mainly of Uranium 238, was ignificantly ess fissionable than Uranium 235. Uranium would have to be enriched, a very difficult process. Another possibility was to use Plutonium, a synthetic material that could be produced in the nuc
A reactor had to be constructed with only a very small margin for error. Enrico Fermi was attempting to establish the first nuclear chain reaction. The project separated into three teams of scientists to separate out the few kilograms of fissile material needed for a bomb. In the spherical piece of uranium, the surface area is much smaller and a greater proportion of neutrons remain in the uranium to sustain the chain reaction. The scientists who worked on the Manhattan project during World War II knew that nuclear energy could be released from a single fissile nucleus. The problem that they faced was how to obtain energy from a vast number of fissile nuclear. The nuclear fission bomb that was dropped with such consuming effect over Hiroshima exploded as a result of an uncontrolled chain reaction in its uranium fuel. One team attempted a technique on uranium known as electromagnetic separation. A second team also tried to separate uranium by a gas diffusion method. The third team was headed by Enrico Fermi producing plutonium 239 by bombarding uranium 238 in a nuclear reactor. strips were removed and man witnessed the first atomic reactor at work. It operated for 28 minutes generating 200 watts of power and provided t
Some common words found in the essay are:
War II, Enrico Fermi, University Chicago, Oppenheimer Basically, President Roosevelt, Hiroshima Japan, Europe United, Albert Einstein, Einstein Oppenheimer, chain reaction, uranium 235, enrico fermi, atomic bomb, nuclear fission, uranium 238, bomb dropped, World War, 2 3 neutrons, sample nuclear, nuclear fuel, explosive ability, nuclear chain reaction, chain reaction die, establish nuclear chain, project world war,
Approximate Word count = 835
Approximate Pages = 3 (250 words per page double spaced)
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