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General Kenneth Nichols and the Manhattan Project
Nichols
The Oak Ridger has published the latest in a series of articles about General Kenneth D. Nichols, the Manhattan Project, and the 1954 Atomic Energy Act. The series has been produced by Nichols’ grandniece Barbara Rogers Scollin and Oak Ridge (Tenn.) city historian David Ray Smith. Gen. Nichols (1907–2000) was the district engineer for the Manhattan Engineer District during the Manhattan Project.
As Smith and Scollin explain, Nichols “had supervision of the research and development connected with, and the design, construction, and operation of, all plants required to produce plutonium-239 and uranium-235, including the construction of the towns of Oak Ridge, Tennessee, and Richland, Washington. The responsibility of his position was massive as he oversaw a workforce of both military and civilian personnel of approximately 125,000; his Oak Ridge office became the center of the wartime atomic energy’s activities.”
J. H. Whealton, R. J. Raridon, D. J. Hoffman, T. L. Owens, M. A. Bell, A. M. Goswitz, F. W. Baity, J. L. Bledsoe, W. R. Becraft
Fusion Science and Technology | Volume 8 | Number 1 | July 1985 | Pages 400-404
Electrical and Nuclear Component Design | Proceedings of the Sixth Topical Meeting on the Technology of Fusion Energy (San Francisco, California, March 3-7, 1985) | doi.org/10.13182/FST85-A40077
Articles are hosted by Taylor and Francis Online.
Using circuit theory and solutions of a scalar two-dimensional Laplace equation for the electrostatic potential, we examine various feedthroughs of interest for voltage holding, voltage standing wave ratio (VSWR) and impedance characteristics. Suitable inhomogeneous Dirichlet, scalar boundary conditions are imposed for the potentials for the calculation of the electrostatic fields. The inhomogeneous vector Newman boundary conditions on the surface of the dielectric are dispatched by use of a conformal mapping. Several feedthroughs are examined: old Princeton Large Torus (PLT), JÜLICH designs, and several Oak Ridge National Laboratory (ORNL) designs that have been actually fabricated and exhaustively tested. Some of these feedthrough configurations have been optimized to provide constant 50-Ω impedance or minimum VSWR.
