biography
pronunciation:
[silah(r)d]
| sex:
| male
|
| lived:
| (1898–1964)
|
| biography:
| Physicist, born in Budapest, Hungary. He studied at Budapest and Berlin universities, fleeing from Germany in 1933. He worked first in London, then in 1938 emigrated to the USA, where he began work on nuclear physics at Columbia University. In 1934 he had taken a patent on nuclear fission as an energy source, and on hearing of Otto Hahn and Lise Meitner's fission of uranium (1938), he approached Einstein in order to write together to President Roosevelt, warning him of the possibility of atomic bombs. He was a central figure in the Manhattan Project, and after the War became a strong proponent of the peaceful uses of atomic energy. In 1957 he began participating in the Pugwash Conferences. |
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