Albert Einstein's Involvement With The Atomic Bomb

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Born on March 14, 1879, Albert Einstein is considered to be one of the greatest physicist and mathematician to date. He grew up in a life of poverty in Munich, Germany, with his parents Pauline and Hermann Einstein. He was unable to communicate with ease until later in his life. However, Einstein continued with his education, starting at age 6 in 1885. In 1894, his family had relocated to Italy, because of his father’s failed business. By 16 had discovered his love of geometry and its clear, certain proofs, and had mastered calculus, which he used later for physics problems. At this age, he had ideas of the implications of what could be done with waves of light, which would later influence his theory of relativity (Johnshepler). This is where, …show more content…

His involvement with the atomic bomb was heavily influenced by World War II in the 1940s as well as nuclear chemistry developments. It involved the idea that there is a relationship between the mass of an object and the amount of energy it can be converted to using the speed of light. This leads into the idea of using Uranium and Plutonium to produce energy in atomic bombs through nuclear fission, a popular theory going around at the time, which was a huge influence for Einstein. Nuclear fission, or the splitting of the nucleus of an atom, generates energy and causes an explosion. Each nuclear fission reaction requires a certain critical mass, or the amount of substance needed to start a chain reaction that will lead to an explosion. In the first atomic bomb, the Little Boy, Uranium-235 was used, as Uranium-238 fails to complete nuclear fission. Gaseous diffusion, centrifuges, electromagnetic separation, and liquid thermal diffusion were all possible methods for obtaining Uranium-235, as only 0.7% is found naturally. The Little Boy was dropped on Hiroshima in August of 1945. Later, another atomic bomb, the Fat Man, was also developed. This bomb utilized the same chemical and physical ideas of critical mass, nuclear fission, and binding energies, but used Plutonium-239 instead of Uranium-235, which because of its properties affected the size and design of the bomb itself. Although Plutonium-240 is more abundant, its radioactivity would increase the rate of reaction, consequently lowering the total energy output. The new design, designed by physicist Seth Neddermeyer, squeezed and consolidated Plutonium very quickly, increasing its density and pressure, and in effect increasing the total energy released. The Fat Man was dropped on Nagasaki in 1945 as well (Atomic Heritage Foundation). The 1940s and World War II tied in with this well for

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