Mark Oliphant

Quotes

• “I, who had been in favour of nuclear energy for generating electricity … I suddenly realised that anybody who has a nuclear reactor can extract the plutonium from the reactor and make nuclear weapons, so that a country which has a nuclear reactor can, at any moment that it wants to, become a nuclear weapons power. And I, right from the beginning, have been terribly worried by the existence of nuclear weapons and very much against their use.”
• “I was a member of a group that was led by Niels Bohr, after the test in Alamogordo, that was very much opposed to the use of this new weapon on civilian cities. … But by and large we were in a minority, but a rather distinguished minority. But the trouble was that this second memorandum to Roosevelt went off to him, but he never read it, he died before he read it. And Truman, of course, was a different kettle of fish.”

via Wikiquote · CC BY-SA

Key facts

Born

Marcus Laurence Elwin Oliphant , ( 1901-10-08 ) 8 October 1901, Adelaide , South Australia, Australia

Died

14 July 2000 (2000-07-14) (aged 98), Canberra , Australian Capital Territory, Australia

Education

University of Adelaide Trinity College, Cambridge

Known for

Co-discovery of tritium , helium-3 and nuclear fusion Development of microwave radar

Awards

Fellow of the Royal Society (1937) Hughes Medal (1943) Faraday Medal (1948) James Cook Medal (1974) ANZAAS Medal (1979)

Institutions

Cavendish Laboratory Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory University of Birmingham Australian National University

Thesis

The Neutralization of Positive Ions at Metal Surfaces, and the Emission of Secondary Electrons (1929)

Doctoral advisor

Ernest Rutherford

Doctoral students

Ernest William Titterton Alan Howard Ward

Monarch

Elizabeth II

Premier

Don Dunstan

Lieutenant governor

Sir Mellis Napier (1971–1973) Sir Walter Crocker (1973–1976)

Preceded by

Sir James Harrison

Succeeded by

Sir Douglas Nicholls

Party

Australia Party (until 1977), Australian Democrats (from 1977)

via Wikipedia infobox

Wikidata facts

Image

Sir Mark Oliphant.jpg

via Wikidata · CC0