Nuclear chain reaction Timeline of Events

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Nuclear chain reaction

A nuclear chain reaction occurs when one nuclear reaction causes an average of one or more nuclear reactions, thus leading to a self-propagating number of these reactions. The specific nuclear reaction may be the fission of heavy isotopes or the fusion of light isotopes...

Timeline of Events

1933

9.12.1933

Leó Szilárd, waiting for a red light on Southampton Row in Bloomsbury, conceives the idea of the nuclear chain reaction.

1942

12.2.1942

Manhattan Project: A team led by Enrico Fermi initiates the first self-sustaining nuclear chain reaction.

1946

12.25.1946

The first in Europe artificial, self-sustaining nuclear chain reaction was initiated within Soviet nuclear reactor F-1.