The Metallurgical Laboratory was a scientific laboratory at the University of Chicago that was established in February 1942. Its objectives were to produce reactors to convert uranium to plutonium, to find ways to separate the plutonium from uranium, and to build an atomic bomb. Scientists who worked there included Enrico Fermi, James Franck, Eugene Wigner and Glenn Seaborg. The Met Lab was succeeded by the Argonne National Laboratory, which became the first of the national laboratories in July 1946.
About Metallurgical Laboratory in brief
The Metallurgical Laboratory was a scientific laboratory at the University of Chicago that was established in February 1942. It researched plutonium’s chemistry and metallurgy, designed the world’s first nuclear reactors to produce it, and developed chemical processes to separate it from other elements. Scientists who worked there included Enrico Fermi, James Franck, Eugene Wigner and Glenn Seaborg. At its peak on 1 July 1944, it had 2,008 staff. Its objectives were to produce reactors to convert uranium to plutonium, to find ways to separate the plutonium from uranium, and to build an atomic bomb. The work of the Met Lab also led to the creation of the Enrici Fermani Institute and the JamesFranck Institute at the university. It was established as part of the Metallurgical Project, also known as the \”Pile\” or ‘X-10’ Project, headed by Chicago professor Arthur H. Compton, a Nobel Prize laureate. The Met Lab was succeeded by the Argonne National Laboratory, which became the first of the national laboratories, the Argonne National Laboratory, in July 1946. It is now one of the world’s leading nuclear research centres, with a staff of more than 2,000 people, and is home to the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NS&T) and the Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory (LBNL) It is also the site of the largest nuclear research reactor in the world, the Chicago Pile-3, which went critical in May 1944 and was first operated at full power in July 1944.
It has been named after Chicago University professor Arthur Pile, who was responsible for the first controlled nuclear chain reaction in December 1942, in the reactor Chicago Ple-1. The lab also designed the X-10 Graphite Reactor in Oak Ridge, Tennessee, and the B Reactor at the Hanford Engineer Works in the state of Washington. In August 1942 the lab’s chemical section was the first to chemically separate a weighable sample of plutonium, and on 2 December 1942 it produced the firstcontrolled nuclear reaction. The Metallurgical laboratory was led by Richard L. Doan, Samuel K. Allison, Joyce C. Stearns and Farrington Daniels, and was based at Stagg Field, the university’s old football stadium. It also worked with DuPont to develop the bismuth phosphate process used to separate plutonium from Uranium. It had a total of 2,200 staff at its peak, with 1,000 of them working on nuclear reactor development and research. In April 1941, the National Defense Research Committee asked Arthur Compton to report on the uranium program. He found that minute quantities of plutonium could be created in cyclotrons, but it was not feasible to produce in a large quantity that way. On December 20, 1941, a 60-inch cyclotron at the University of California produced 28 μg of plutonium in the 60- inch cyclotran there in May 1941.
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