Of all the contributions made throughout history, the advancements throughout the 20th century marked a new era. An era of technology, development and an era of seemingly endless war. While many people contributed during the course of World War II, the contributions of J. Robert Oppenheimer such as the Manhattan Project, the atomic bomb, and the ending of World War II, were the most significant.
Oppenheimer was born into a well educated family in the heart of New York City (Scherer and Fletcher, 20). He became a physicist, following a path through quantum mechanics and when the time came, the leader of the Manhattan Project. Initially, “there was no central scientific authority running the project” (Scherer and Fletcher, 53-54) which considerably …show more content…
The bomb used Uranium-235, something which had been discovered previously by the Nazi’s. Members of the research team worked countless hours on finding a way to split its nucleus and set off a chain reaction. Oppenheimer found that by shooting neutrons at the nucleus of a Uranium atom, the energy would grow to the point where it could explode (Andrew Radar Studios). This process was highly expensive, one of the main reasons other countries were not able to support this project. It took countless amounts of Uranium and hundreds of hours of work. “In the end, the Manhattan Project cost the United States $2 billion” (Stock). Oppenheimer and his team worked on developing the bomb after their …show more content…
The USSR was rapidly developing their own nuclear weapon, modelled after Oppenheimer's work, to use against America. There was “mutually assured destruction” guaranteed between the two global superpowers with the hypothetical use of this weapon. “Understanding clearly what he had wrought and terrified by the future this augured, he later struggled for international control of nuclear weapons and fought to prevent development of the hydrogen bomb” (Kuznick). He was an advocate for no further use of this technology. He was hailed as an amazing weapon creator but a terrible
Oppenheimer was born into a well educated family in the heart of New York City (Scherer and Fletcher, 20). He became a physicist, following a path through quantum mechanics and when the time came, the leader of the Manhattan Project. Initially, “there was no central scientific authority running the project” (Scherer and Fletcher, 53-54) which considerably …show more content…
The bomb used Uranium-235, something which had been discovered previously by the Nazi’s. Members of the research team worked countless hours on finding a way to split its nucleus and set off a chain reaction. Oppenheimer found that by shooting neutrons at the nucleus of a Uranium atom, the energy would grow to the point where it could explode (Andrew Radar Studios). This process was highly expensive, one of the main reasons other countries were not able to support this project. It took countless amounts of Uranium and hundreds of hours of work. “In the end, the Manhattan Project cost the United States $2 billion” (Stock). Oppenheimer and his team worked on developing the bomb after their …show more content…
The USSR was rapidly developing their own nuclear weapon, modelled after Oppenheimer's work, to use against America. There was “mutually assured destruction” guaranteed between the two global superpowers with the hypothetical use of this weapon. “Understanding clearly what he had wrought and terrified by the future this augured, he later struggled for international control of nuclear weapons and fought to prevent development of the hydrogen bomb” (Kuznick). He was an advocate for no further use of this technology. He was hailed as an amazing weapon creator but a terrible