The nuclear chain reaction releases several million times more energy per reaction than any chemical reaction. ==History== Chemical chain reactions were first proposed by German chemist Max Bodenstein in 1913, and were reasonably well understood before nuclear chain reactions were proposed.
However, the neutron had been discovered in 1932, shortly before, as the product of a nuclear reaction.
It was understood that chemical chain reactions were responsible for exponentially increasing rates in reactions, such as produced in chemical explosions. The concept of a nuclear chain reaction was reportedly first hypothesized by Hungarian scientist Leó Szilárd on September 12, 1933.
He filed a patent for his idea of a simple nuclear reactor the following year. In 1936, Szilárd attempted to create a chain reaction using beryllium and indium, but was unsuccessful.
Nuclear fission was discovered by Otto Hahn and Fritz Strassmann in December 1938 and explained theoretically in January 1939 by Lise Meitner and her nephew Otto Robert Frisch.
Nuclear fission was discovered by Otto Hahn and Fritz Strassmann in December 1938 and explained theoretically in January 1939 by Lise Meitner and her nephew Otto Robert Frisch.
Kowarski in Paris searched for, and discovered, neutron multiplication in uranium, proving that a nuclear chain reaction by this mechanism was indeed possible. On May 4, 1939, Joliot-Curie, Halban, and Kowarski filed three patents.
Roosevelt, warning of the possibility that Nazi Germany might be attempting to build an atomic bomb. On December 2, 1942, a team led by Fermi (and including Szilárd) produced the first artificial self-sustaining nuclear chain reaction with the Chicago Pile-1 (CP-1) experimental reactor in a racquets court below the bleachers of Stagg Field at the University of Chicago.
Compton's Metallurgical Laboratory of the Manhattan Project; the lab was later renamed Argonne National Laboratory, and tasked with conducting research in harnessing fission for nuclear energy. In 1956, Paul Kuroda of the University of Arkansas postulated that a natural fission reactor may have once existed.
Kuroda's prediction was verified with the discovery of evidence of natural self-sustaining nuclear chain reactions in the past at Oklo in Gabon in September 1972. ==Fission chain reaction== Fission chain reactions occur because of interactions between neutrons and fissile isotopes (such as 235U).
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