Which scientific breakthrough was made at Stagg Field at the University of Chicago?

Answer 1

>>The world's first controlled chain reaction" was the scientific breakthrough made at Stagg Field at the University of Chicago.

A group of expatriate scientists headed by Enrico Fermi huddled anxiously on December 2, 1942 around their instruments in a laboratory underneath the University of Chicago's Stagg Field for achieving 'the world's first controlled chain reaction and in so doing, heralded the birth of the nuclear age. History was made in what had been a squash-rackets court.

Enrico Fermi thought that he could achieve a controlled chain reaction using natural uranium. He had started this work with Leo Szilard at Columbia University, but moved to the University of Chicago in early 1942. The first nuclear reactor, called a pile, was a daring and sophisticated experiment that required nearly 50 tons of machined and shaped uranium and uranium oxide pellets along with 385 tons - the equivalent of four railroad coal hoppers - of graphite blocks, machined on site. The pile itself was assembled in a squash court under the football field at the University of Chicago from the layered graphite blocks and uranium and uranium oxide lumps (Fermi's term) arranged roughly in a sphere with an anticipated 13 foot radius. Neutron absorbing, cadmium coated control rods were inserted in the pile. By slowly withdrawing the rods, neutron activity within the pile was expected to increase and at some point, Fermi predicted, there would be one neutron produced for each neutron absorbed in either producing fission or by the control rods.

Construction of the main pile at Chicago started in November. The pile was enclosed in a balloon cloth bag constructed by Goodyear Tire and Rubber Company which could be evacuated to remove the neutron-capturing air. The bag was hung with one side left open; in the center of the floor a circular layer of graphic bricks was placed. This and each succeeding layer of the pile was braced by a wooden frame. Alternate layers contained the uranium. By this layer-on-layer construction a roughly spherical pile of uranium and graphite was formed. Facilities for the machining of graphite bricks were installed in the West Stands.Day after day the pile grew toward its final shape.

Precisely at 3:25 p.m.of Decemcer 2,1942, Chicago time, scientist George Weil withdrew the cadmium-plated control rod and by his action man unleashed and controlled the energy of the atom. As those who witnessed the experiment became aware of what had happened, smiles spread over their faces and a quiet ripple of applause could be hear. It was a tribute to Enrico Fermi, Nobel Prize winner, to whom, more than to any other person, the success of the experiment was due.

The achievement of the first sustained nuclear reaction was the beginning of a new age in nuclear physics and the study of the atom. On December 28, 1942, upon reviewing a report from his advisors, President Franklyn Roosevelt recommended building full-scale plants to produce both U-235 and Pu-239.This changed the effort to develop nuclear weapons from experimental work in academic laboratories administered by the U.S. Office of Scientific Research and Development to a huge effort by private industry. This work, supervised by the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, was codenamed the Manhattan Project.☺

Answer 2

Stagg Field is the name of two different football fields for the University of Chicago.

The first Stagg Field was a stadium at the University of Chicago in Chicago, Illinois. It was primarily used for American football, and was the home field of the University of Chicago. Stagg Field originally opened in 1893 as Marshall Field after Marshall Field donated land to the university to build the stadium. In 1913, the field was renamed Stagg Field after their famous coach Amos Alonzo Stagg. The final capacity, after several stadium expansions, was 50,000. The University of Chicago discontinued its football program after 1939 and left the Big Ten in 1946. The stadium was demolished in 1957.

The field is more well known for its place in the Manhattan Project. On December 2, 1942 Enrico Fermi and his team set off the first nuclear chain reaction at Chicago Pile-1 in a racquets court under the west stands of the abandoned stadium. The old Stagg Field plot of land is currently home to the Regenstein Library.

The Manhattan Project refers to the first project to develop the first nuclear weapons during World War II by the United States, the United Kingdom and Canada. Formally designated as the Manhattan Engineering District (MED), it refers specifically to the period of the project from 1942-1946 under the control of the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, under the administration of General Leslie R. Groves, with its scientific research directed by the American physicist J. Robert Oppenheimer.

The project succeeded in developing and detonating three nuclear weapons in 1945: a test detonation on July 16 (the Trinity test) near Alamogordo, New Mexico; an enriched uranium bomb code-named "Little Boy" detonated on August 6 over Hiroshima, Japan; and a plutonium bomb code-named "Fat Man" on August 9 over Nagasaki, Japan.

The project's roots lay in scientists' fears since the 1930s that Nazi Germany was also investigating such weapons of its own. Born out of a small research program that began in 1939, the Manhattan Project would eventually employ more than 130,000 people and cost a total of nearly $2 billion USD ($20 billion in 2004 dollars based on CPI), and result in the creation of multiple production and research sites operated in secret

Answer 3

The first controlled fission reaction.


Doug

Answer 4

controled chain reaction

Answer 5

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