Word: atomically
(lookup in dictionary)
(lookup stats)
Dates: all
Sort By: most recent first
(reverse)
...pigment from the blood of mollusks. He and his co-workers at the University of Upsala bombarded the hemocyanin particles with quanta of energy in the form of ultraviolet light. Certain wave lengths of the bombarding radiation split the blood pigment molecules into halves. This was like splitting inorganic atoms in a high-voltage atom-smasher...
Although the uranium atom was the most massive in the standard table of 92 elements, there was no theoretical reason why heavier elements should not exist...
Professor Fermi found them by bombarding uranium with a stream of neutrons (tiny particles which weigh about the same as a proton or hydrogen nucleus but have no electric charge). His bombarding neutrons slipped into the hearts of the uranium atoms, forming an unstable new element, ckarhcuium-No. 93. Similarly, in 1936, Dr. Fermi created a few atoms of ckaosmium-No. 94. Some of his other discoveries about neutrons: Having no electric charge, neutrons are not affected by the negative electric field outside an atom or by the positive charge on its nucleus. The only thing that stops them...
...Slow neutrons," by one of those paradoxes which are common in atomic physics, make better bullets than fast neutrons for creating artificially radioactive substances. Having no electrical resistance to fight against, a slow neutron simply sidles up to an atom and "falls" into the nucleus-much as a slowly rolling golf ball drops into the cup whereas a faster one may roll by. Capture of a neutron makes an overweight, unstable atom which spits out particles or radiation or both. Fermi's slow neutrons have induced this kind of radioactivity in more than 40 elements...
Born in Rome 37 years ago, Enrico Fermi was introduced to the atom at the University of Pisa, continued his acquaintance with it at Göttingen and Leyden, joined the University of Rome faculty in 1927. Short, wiry, dapper and cheerful, he has visited the U. S. several times, speaks heavily accented English, likes skiing, tennis. Some time ago Benito Mussolini, who is not insensitive to the prestige of Italian science, saw to it that Fermi got a fine new laboratory...