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Nuclear Energy Conference & Expo (NECX)
September 8–11, 2025
Atlanta, GA|Atlanta Marriott Marquis
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The Frisch-Peierls memorandum: A seminal document of nuclear history
The Manhattan Project is usually considered to have been initiated with Albert Einstein’s letter to President Franklin Roosevelt in October 1939. However, a lesser-known document that was just as impactful on wartime nuclear history was the so-called Frisch-Peierls memorandum. Prepared by two refugee physicists at the University of Birmingham in Britain in early 1940, this manuscript was the first technical description of nuclear weapons and their military, strategic, and ethical implications to reach high-level government officials on either side of the Atlantic. The memorandum triggered the initiation of the British wartime nuclear program, which later merged with the Manhattan Engineer District.
L. F. Hansen, C. Wong, T. T. Komoto, B. A. Pohl, R. J. Howerton
Nuclear Technology | Volume 51 | Number 1 | November 1980 | Pages 70-77
Technical Paper | Material | doi.org/10.13182/NT80-A32557
Articles are hosted by Taylor and Francis Online.
Spherical assemblies of copper with radii (R) equal to 1.0, 3.0, and 5.0 mean-free-paths (mfp) for 14-MeV neutrons, niobium (R = 0.9 and 3.2 mfp), 232Th (R = 1.0 mfp), and 238U (R = 1.0 and 3.1 mfp) have been bombarded with a centered nominal 14-MeV neutron source. The neutron leakage spectra have been measured from 0.8 to 14 MeV using a stilbene scintillator, time-of-flight techniques, pulse-shape discrimination and ∼10-m flight paths. The measured spectra are compared with calculations carried out with TARTNP, a coupled neutron-photon Monte Carlo transport code, using the ENDF/B-IV and -V neutron libraries. For copper and 238U, the reevaluated cross sections at ∼14 MeV in ENDF/B-V are somewhat less satisfactory in fitting the experimental results than those in ENDF/B-IV. For 232Th, ENDF/B-V shows significant improvement. The niobium cross sections, which were not reevaluated between ENDF/B-IV and -V, provide poor fits to the measurements.