The US government's super-secret program to produce an atomic bomb for use during World War II.
| Name | Occupation | Birth | Death | Known for |
|---|
| Luis W. Alvarez |
Physicist |
13-Jun-1911 |
1-Sep-1988 |
Particle accelerator, extinction of dinosaurs |
| Harold D. Babcock |
Astronomer |
24-Jan-1882 |
8-Apr-1968 |
Solar radiation |
| Kenneth Bainbridge |
Physicist |
27-Jul-1904 |
14-Jul-1996 |
Director of the Trinity atomic test |
| Hans Bethe |
Physicist |
2-Jul-1906 |
6-Mar-2005 |
Atomic scientist |
| Felix Bloch |
Physicist |
23-Oct-1905 |
10-Sep-1983 |
Nuclear magnetic resonance |
| Aage N. Bohr |
Physicist |
19-Jun-1922 |
8-Sep-2009 |
Determined shapes of nuclei |
| Niels Bohr |
Physicist |
7-Oct-1885 |
18-Nov-1962 |
Father of Quantum Theory |
| Gregory Breit |
Physicist |
14-Jul-1899 |
11-Sep-1981 |
Proton-proton dispersion |
| Vannevar Bush |
Scientist |
11-Mar-1890 |
30-Jun-1974 |
Pre-internet visionary |
| Melvin Calvin |
Chemist |
8-Apr-1911 |
8-Jan-1997 |
Deciphered photosynthesis |
| Walter S. Carpenter, Jr. |
Business |
8-Jan-1888 |
1976 |
President of DuPont, 1940-48 |
| James Chadwick |
Physicist |
20-Oct-1891 |
24-Jul-1974 |
Discovered the neutron |
| Owen Chamberlain |
Physicist |
10-Jul-1920 |
28-Feb-2006 |
Co-Discoverer of the antiproton |
| Samuel T. Cohen |
Physicist |
25-Jan-1921 |
28-Nov-2010 |
Neutron bomb |
| Arthur H. Compton |
Physicist |
10-Sep-1892 |
15-Mar-1962 |
Discovered the Compton Effect |
| Karl T. Compton |
Physicist |
15-Sep-1887 |
22-Jun-1954 |
Bikini Island atomic tests |
| James B. Conant |
Educator |
26-Mar-1893 |
11-Feb-1978 |
President of Harvard, 1933-53 |
| Edward Condon |
Physicist |
2-Mar-1902 |
26-Mar-1974 |
Quantum Mechanics |
| George A. Cowan |
Physicist |
15-Feb-1920 |
20-Apr-2012 |
Founder, Santa Fe Institute |
| Harry K. Daghlian |
Physicist |
4-May-1921 |
15-Sep-1945 |
Casualty of the Manhattan Project |
| Martin Deutsch |
Physicist |
29-Jun-1917 |
16-Aug-2002 |
Discovered positronium |
| Albert Einstein |
Physicist |
14-Mar-1879 |
18-Apr-1955 |
Theory of relativity |
| Enrico Fermi |
Physicist |
29-Sep-1901 |
29-Nov-1954 |
First controlled nuclear chain reaction |
| Richard Feynman |
Physicist |
11-May-1918 |
15-Feb-1988 |
Surely he's joking |
| Val Fitch |
Physicist |
10-Mar-1923 |
5-Feb-2015 |
Time not necessarily reversible |
| William A. Fowler |
Astronomer |
9-Aug-1911 |
14-Mar-1995 |
Element generation within stars |
| James Franck |
Physicist |
26-Aug-1882 |
21-May-1964 |
Franck-Hertz experiment |
| Otto Robert Frisch |
Physicist |
1-Oct-1904 |
22-Sep-1979 |
Described fission |
| Klaus Fuchs |
Spy |
29-Dec-1911 |
28-Jan-1988 |
Manhattan Project scientist, spy for USSR |
| Roy J. Glauber |
Physicist |
1-Sep-1925 |
|
Quantum optics |
| Maria Goeppert-Mayer |
Physicist |
28-Jun-1906 |
20-Feb-1972 |
Shell nuclear model |
| Samuel Goudsmit |
Physicist |
11-Jul-1902 |
4-Dec-1978 |
Conceived idea of Quantum Spin |
| Gordon Gould |
Physicist |
17-Jul-1920 |
16-Sep-2005 |
Invented the laser, arguably |
| David Greenglass |
Spy |
2-Mar-1922 |
1-Jul-2014 |
Gave atomic secrets to Julius Rosenberg |
| Leslie R. Groves |
Military |
17-Aug-1896 |
13-Jul-1970 |
Director of the Manhattan Project |
| Mayo D. Hersey |
Engineer |
30-Aug-1886 |
5-Sep-1978 |
Tribology |
| William A. Higinbotham |
Physicist |
25-Oct-1910 |
10-Nov-1994 |
Physicist, Tennis for Two |
| Donald F. Hornig |
Educator |
17-Mar-1920 |
21-Jan-2013 |
President of Brown University, 1970-76 |
| Jerome Karle |
Chemist |
18-Jun-1918 |
6-Jun-2013 |
X-Ray diffraction studies |
| Ernest Lawrence |
Physicist |
8-Aug-1901 |
27-Aug-1958 |
Inventor of the cyclotron |
| Willard F. Libby |
Chemist |
17-Dec-1908 |
8-Sep-1980 |
Carbon-14 dating technique |
| Alfred Lee Loomis |
Physicist |
4-Nov-1887 |
1-Aug-1975 |
Millionaire scientist |
| John J. McCloy |
Military |
31-Mar-1895 |
11-Mar-1989 |
World Bank, Warren Commission |
| Edwin M. McMillan |
Physicist |
18-Sep-1907 |
7-Sep-1991 |
Discovered neptunium and plutonium |
| Philip Moon |
Physicist |
17-May-1907 |
9-Oct-1994 |
Gamma ray fluorescence |
| Robert S. Mulliken |
Chemist |
7-Jun-1896 |
31-Oct-1986 |
Molecular orbital theory |
| Mark Oliphant |
Physicist |
8-Oct-1901 |
14-Jul-2000 |
Deuterium reactions |
| Frank Oppenheimer |
Physicist |
14-Aug-1912 |
3-Feb-1985 |
Founder of the Exploratorium |
| Robert Oppenheimer |
Physicist |
22-Apr-1904 |
18-Feb-1967 |
Physicist, headed the Manhattan Project |
| Pief Panofsky |
Physicist |
24-Apr-1919 |
24-Sep-2007 |
Stanford Linear Accelerator |
| Rudolf Peierls |
Physicist |
5-Jun-1907 |
19-Sep-1995 |
Frisch-Peierls Memorandum |
| Gilbert Plass |
Physicist |
22-Mar-1922 |
1-Mar-2004 |
Climate change scientist |
| James Rainwater |
Physicist |
9-Dec-1917 |
31-May-1986 |
Determined shapes of nuclei |
| Norman F. Ramsey |
Physicist |
27-Aug-1915 |
4-Nov-2011 |
Energy levels of atoms |
| Frederick Reines |
Physicist |
16-Mar-1918 |
26-Aug-1998 |
Co-Discover of the neutrino |
| Bruno Rossi |
Astronomer |
13-Apr-1905 |
21-Nov-1993 |
Rossi curve and magnetopause |
| Joseph Rotblat |
Physicist |
4-Nov-1908 |
31-Aug-2005 |
Nuclear physicist, anti-nuke activist |
| Julian Schwinger |
Physicist |
12-Feb-1918 |
16-Jul-1994 |
Quantum electrodynamics |
| Glenn Seaborg |
Physicist |
19-Apr-1912 |
25-Feb-1999 |
Co-Discoverer of Plutonium |
| Emilio Segrè |
Physicist |
30-Jan-1905 |
22-Apr-1989 |
Co-Discoverer of the antiproton |
| Maurice M. Shapiro |
Physicist |
13-Nov-1915 |
27-Feb-2008 |
Composition and origin of cosmic rays |
| William Shurcliff |
Physicist |
27-Mar-1909 |
20-Jun-2006 |
Manhattan Project physicist |
| Louis Slotin |
Physicist |
1-Dec-1910 |
30-May-1946 |
Died tickling the dragon's tail |
| Chauncey Starr |
Physicist |
14-Apr-1912 |
17-Apr-2007 |
Electric Power Research Institute |
| Henry L. Stimson |
Government |
21-Sep-1867 |
20-Oct-1950 |
US Secretary of War 1911-13, 1940-45 |
| Leo Szilard |
Physicist |
11-Feb-1898 |
30-May-1964 |
Nuclear chain reaction |
| Edward Teller |
Physicist |
15-Jan-1908 |
9-Sep-2003 |
Father of the Hydrogen Bomb |
| Paul Tibbets |
Military |
23-Feb-1915 |
1-Nov-2007 |
Pilot of the Enola Gay |
| Harold C. Urey |
Chemist |
29-Apr-1893 |
5-Jan-1981 |
Discovered Deuterium |
| John H. van Vleck |
Physicist |
13-Mar-1899 |
27-Oct-1980 |
Quantum theory of paramagnetism |
| John von Neumann |
Mathematician |
28-Dec-1903 |
8-Feb-1957 |
Computing pioneer, inventor of Game Theory |
| Alvin M. Weinberg |
Physicist |
20-Apr-1915 |
18-Oct-2006 |
Nuclear scientist |
| Victor Weisskopf |
Physicist |
19-Sep-1908 |
21-Apr-2002 |
Head of CERN, 1961-65 |
| John Archibald Wheeler |
Physicist |
9-Jul-1911 |
13-Apr-2008 |
The Mechanism of Nuclear Fission |
| Eugene Wigner |
Physicist |
17-Nov-1902 |
1-Jan-1995 |
Law of conservation of parity |
| Maurice Wilkins |
Biologist |
15-Dec-1916 |
5-Oct-2004 |
Took X-ray pictures of DNA |
| Leona Woods |
Physicist |
9-Aug-1919 |
10-Nov-1986 |
Physicist at University of Chicago |
