The History and Mechanism of the Atomic Bomb :: Atomic Bombs Physics Weapons Essays

The History and Mechanism of the Atomic Bomb ----------------------- -+ Table of Contents +- ----------------------- I. The History of the Atomic Bomb ------------------------------ A). Development (The Manhattan Project) B). Detonation 1). Hiroshima 2). Nagasaki 3). Byproducts of atomic detonations 4). Blast Zones II. Nuclear Fission/Nuclear Fusion ------------------------------ A). Fission (A-Bomb) & Fusion (H-Bomb) B). U-235, U-238 and Plutonium III. The Mechanism of The Bomb ------------------------- A). Altimeter B). Air Pressure Detonator C). Detonating Head(s) D). Explosive Charge(s) E). Neutron Deflector F). Uranium & Plutonium G). Lead Shield H). Fuses IV. The Diagram of The Bomb ----------------------- A). The Uranium Bomb B). The Plutonium Bomb The History of the Atomic Bomb ------------------------------ On August 2nd 1939, just before the beginning of World War II, Albert Einstein wrote to then President Franklin D. Roosevelt. Einstein and several other scientists told Roosevelt of efforts in Nazi Germany to purify U-235 with which might in turn be used to build an atomic bomb. It was shortly thereafter that the United States Government began the serious undertaking known only then as the Manhattan Project. Simply put, the Manhattan Project was committed to expedient research and production that would produce a viable atomic bomb. The most complicated issue to be addressed was the production of ample amounts of `enriched' uranium to sustain a chain reaction. At the time, Uranium-235 was very hard to extract. In fact, the ratio of conversion from Uranium ore to Uranium metal is 500:1. An additional drawback is that the 1 part of Uranium that is finally refined from the ore consists of over 99% Uranium-238, which is practically useless for an atomic bomb. To make it even more difficult, U-235 and U-238 are precisely similar in their chemical makeup. This proved to be as much of a challenge as separating a solution of sucrose from a solution of glucose. No ordinary chemical extraction could separate the two isotopes. Only mechanical methods could effectively separate U-235 from U-238. Several scientists at Columbia University managed to solve this dilemma. A massive enrichment laboratory/plant was constructed at Oak Ridge, Tennessee. H.C. Urey, along with his associates and colleagues at Columbia University, devised a system that worked on the principle of gaseous diffusion. Following this process, Ernest O. Lawrence (inventor of the Cyclotron) at the University of California in Berkeley implemented a process involving magnetic separation of the two isotopes. Following the first two processes, a gas centrifuge was used to further separate the lighter U-235 from the heavier non-fissionable U-238 by their mass.