Los Alamos: Beginning of an Era, 1943-1945

Los Alamos, NM: Los Alamos Scientific Laboratory, c. 1970. Presumed First Edition/First Printing. Wraps. Very good. Hal Olsen (Cover Art). 28 cm, 64 pages. Wrap. Illustrations. Slight wear and soiling to covers, white cover. Information for this work was compiled and edited from previously published articles and brochures on Los Alamos history. Weapons whose explosive output is exclusively from fission reactions are commonly referred to as atomic bombs or atom bombs (abbreviated as A-bombs). In fission weapons, a mass of fissile material (enriched uranium or plutonium) is assembled into a supercritical mass-the amount of material needed to start an exponentially growing nuclear chain reaction-either by shooting one piece of sub-critical material into another (the "gun" method) or by compressing using explosive lenses a sub-critical sphere of material using chemical explosives to many times its original density (the "implosion" method). Only the latter approach can be used if the fissile material is plutonium. The amount of energy released by fission bombs can range from the equivalent of just under a ton to upwards of 500,000 tons (500 kilotons) of TNT All fission reactions necessarily generate fission products, the radioactive remains of the atomic nuclei split by the fission reactions. Many fission products are either highly radioactive (but short-lived) or moderately radioactive (but long-lived), and as such are a serious form of radioactive contamination if not fully contained. Fission products are the principal radioactive component of nuclear fallout. The most commonly used fissile materials for nuclear weapons applications have been uranium-235 and plutonium-239. Los Alamos National Laboratory (or LANL; previously known at various times as Project Y, Los Alamos Laboratory, and Los Alamos Scientific Laboratory[LASL]) is one of two laboratories in the United States in which classified work towards the design of nuclear weapons has been undertaken (the other being Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory). LANL is a United States Department of Energy national laboratory, managed and operated by Los Alamos National Security (LANS), located in Los Alamos, New Mexico. The laboratory is one of the largest science and technology institutions in the world. It conducts multidisciplinary research in fields such as national security, space exploration, renewable energy, medicine, nanotechnology, and supercomputing. The laboratory was founded during World War II as a secret, centralized facility to coordinate the scientific research of the Manhattan Project, the Allied project to develop the first nuclear weapons. In September 1942, the difficulties encountered in conducting preliminary studies on nuclear weapons at universities scattered across the country indicated the need for a laboratory dedicated solely to that purpose. General Leslie Groves wanted a central laboratory at an isolated location for safety, and to keep the scientists away from the populace. It should be at least 200 miles from international boundaries and west of the Mississippi. Major John Dudley suggested Oak City, Utah or Jemez Springs, New Mexico but both were rejected. Manhattan Project scientific director J. Robert Oppenheimer had spent much time in his youth in the New Mexico area, and suggested the Los Alamos Ranch School on the mesa. Dudley had rejected the school as not meeting Groves' criteria, but as soon as Groves saw it he said in effect This is the place. Oppenheimer became the laboratory's first director. During the Manhattan Project, Los Alamos hosted thousands of employees, including many Nobel Prize-winning scientists. The location was a total secret. Its only mailing address was a post office box, number 1663, in Santa Fe, New Mexico. Eventually two other post office boxes were used, 180 and 1539, also in Santa Fe. Though its contract with the University of California was initially intended to be temporary,[citation needed] the relationship was maintained long after the war. Until the atomic bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki, Japan, University of California president Robert Sproul did not know what the purpose of the laboratory was and thought it might be producing a "death ray". The only member of the UC administration who knew its true purpose-indeed, the only one who knew its exact physical location-was the Secretary-Treasurer Robert Underhill, who was in charge of wartime contracts and liabilities. The work of the laboratory culminated in the creation of several atomic devices, one of which was used in the first nuclear test near Alamogordo, New Mexico, codenamed "Trinity", on July 16, 1945. The other two were weapons, "Little Boy" and "Fat Man", which were used in the attacks on Hiroshima and Nagasaki. The Laboratory received the Army-Navy 'E' Award for Excellence in production on October 16, 1945.