Otto Hahn

Otto Hahn was a German radiochemist whose experiments with Fritz Strassmann provided the chemical evidence for nuclear fission. He received the 1944 Nobel Prize in Chemistry.

Fritz Strassmann: A German chemist who collaborated with Otto Hahn on experiments that identified barium among uranium’s reaction products. His chemical analysis with Hahn supplied the evidence that uranium had split.
Nuclear fission: The splitting of an atomic nucleus into lighter nuclei, usually releasing neutrons and energy. Hahn and Strassmann’s results revealed that uranium nuclei could split into lighter elements.
Radioactivity: The spontaneous emission of particles or electromagnetic radiation from unstable atomic nuclei. Research on radioactive substances launched Hahn’s scientific career.
Manhattan Project: The United States-led wartime program that developed the first nuclear weapons during World War II. Hahn discovered fission but did not take part in this weapons-development program.
Lise Meitner: An Austrian-Swedish physicist who interpreted nuclear fission theoretically with Otto Frisch. Meitner had worked with Hahn for decades and explained the physical meaning of his results.
Neutron: A neutral subatomic particle found in atomic nuclei, capable of triggering nuclear reactions when absorbed. Neutron bombardment of uranium produced the reaction products Hahn and Strassmann analyzed.
William Ramsay: A Scottish chemist who discovered several noble gases and received the 1904 Nobel Prize in Chemistry. Hahn studied in Ramsay’s London laboratory before specializing in radioactivity.
Operation Epsilon: The Allied operation that detained and monitored ten German nuclear scientists in 1945. Hahn was among the scientists interned and recorded discussing the Hiroshima bombing.
Otto Robert Frisch: An Austrian-British physicist who, with Lise Meitner, explained nuclear fission and gave it its name. Frisch helped turn Hahn’s chemical finding into a physical account of fission.
Barium: A chemical element with atomic number 56, identified in Hahn and Strassmann’s uranium experiments. Its presence was the unexpected chemical clue that uranium had divided.

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