Leó Szilárd

Leó Szilárd (February 11, 1898 – May 30, 1964) was a Jewish Hungarian-American physicist who worked on the Manhattan Project. He was born in Budapest and died in La Jolla, California.

Developing the idea of the nuclear chain reaction

In 1933 Szilard fled to London to escape Nazi persecution, where he read an article written by Ernest Rutherford in The Times which rejected the concept of atomic energy. Although nuclear fission had not yet been discovered, Szilard was reportedly so annoyed at this dismissal that he conceived of the idea of the nuclear chain reaction while waiting for traffic lights to change on Southampton Row in Bloomsbury. The following year he filed for a patent on the concept.

Related Topics:
1933 - Ernest Rutherford - The Times - Nuclear fission - Traffic light - Bloomsbury - Patent

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Szilard first attempted to create a chain reaction using beryllium and indium, but these elements did not produce a chain reaction. In 1936, he assigned the chain-reaction patent to the British Admiralty to ensure its secrecy ({{UK patent|630726}}). Szilárd also was the co-holder, with Nobel Laureate Enrico Fermi, of the patent on the nuclear reactor ({{US patent|2708656}}).

Related Topics:
Beryllium - Indium - Elements - 1936 - British Admiralty - Nobel Laureate - Enrico Fermi - Nuclear reactor

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In 1938 Szilard accepted an offer to conduct research at Columbia University in Manhattan, and moved to New York, and was soon joined by Fermi. After learning about nuclear fission in 1939, they concluded that uranium would be the element capable of sustaining a chain reaction.

Related Topics:
1938 - Columbia University - Manhattan - New York - 1939 - Uranium

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