Nuclear Fission
Nuclear Fission
Maximilian Muller
Many people have heard of the benefits and negatives of atomic technology but not many of the details and inner workings of these machines. The most common misconception was that this research was only on the atomic bomb and other weapons of mass destruction. This is not the case a lot of the research was to develop power production and medical benefits. These advances have led to some of societies’ greatest errors and triumphs but how did the research start and what made these high-power items becoming so prevalent. Well it all started with nuclear fission which enabled radioactive atoms to split into two smaller and lighter atoms which created a small release of energy which would later be utilized to make atomic bombs.
The US began working on nuclear fission in response to Nazi attempts at creating a bomb this was known as the Manhattan Project. Although the Americans eventually developed a bomb and Nazi Germany did not it was still a very scary reality that the Nazis could possess such deadly weapons. After the invasion of Normandy, the Nazis had taken control of a key heavy water plant that is essential to nuclear research the British were greatly on edge to find out if they would be able to develop a weapon and fire it in the early war. Thankfully people on the research team knew what would happen if Hitler had his hands-on weapons of mass destruction and did everything in their power to sabotage the efforts. If it was not for these efforts the Nazis would have had access to atomic weapons early in the war this would easily led to a Nazi victory since Moscow and London would have been main targets. The US eventually created the weapons in 1945 and used two of them on Japan to end the war. Although these events are a terrible example of what these weapons are capable of they lead to many positive changes.
Most technology comes from war, but atomic weapons are no different some of the most beneficial advances in the modern world stem from these bombs. Nuclear power plants that are now no longer efficient have fed society’s power need for the past 50 years this research was made possible by isotope separation that is based around uranium and separating the heavier variant from the lighter one. In the field of medicine, it was used to create chemo therapy and many other forms of radiation treatment. These methods have brought hope to many people with cancer and other diseases that there is a way to cure it. With research continuing in this field it will continue to raise the survival rate for those diagnosed with the disease. Although it is only applied to radioactive methods treatment it has still been applied to other medical fields. This will not be able to replace the damage done by the bombs, but it will be able to help us in the future.
The future of this field remains open since it is still very new, and a lot of other discoveries can be made. For instance, the radioactive treatments are still very new and hold a lot of promise with the advancements being made in them every day. Not to mention that it is a key component in fighting otherwise uncurable diseases like cancer. Whereas with the weapons with the US and Russia pulling out of a nuclear agreement this could lead to another cold war and arms race. This will lead to more development in the field due to the rising tensions and it will be costly but neither side wants to lose. This is the future of research in this field in the near term.
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