Twentieth Anniversary of the Biology Division of the Oak Ridge National Laboratory
IN THE EARLY 1940's, the area that now holds the Oak Ridge research and development complex was mostly wilderness - a broad lowland strip made up of narrow picturesque valleys paralleled by a series of small wooded ridges and hills. Because of its relative isolation between the Great Smoky Mountains on the southeast and the Cumberland Mountains on the northwest, access to hydroelectric power from the Tennessee Valley Authority, and a plentiful water supply, this wilderness was selected in June 1942 as the site of several phases of the nation's wartime Manhattan Project. The community to house personnel of the "top-secret" development was constructed at a point called "Site-X," which soon came to be known as Oak Ridge. The history that was made here is known throughout the world. Built secretly in 1943-44, under the pseudonym of the Clinton Engineer Works, were three large plants urgently needed to turn out materials for the first nuclear fission bomb. Two plants (Y-12 and K-25) were designed for processes concerned with the separation of uranium-235, and the third (X-10) as a pilot plant for the production of plutonium. The plants operated successfully, World War II was shortened, and the nation's nuclear energy program had begun. The original Manhattan Project biologists first served under H. J. Curtis and later under P. S. Henshaw, and performed experiments directed toward establishing radiation and fission products. At this time the biologists were part of what was then called the "Biological Section," an element of the Health Division of the then-named Clinton Laboratories. Waldo E. Cohn, present head of the Biology Division's Nucleic Acid Chemistry group, had been in charge of a group in the Manhattan Project at the University of Chicago that dealt with the separation of and biological testing for toxicity of highly radioactive fission products. In 1944, this group transferred to Clinton Laboratories' Chemistry Division where they helped to develop the radioisotope product and distribution facility that was announced to the world in 1946. P. C. Tompkins and Joseph X. Khym were also in the early Biological Section with Dr. Cohn, but were temporarily transferred to the Chemistry Division, rejoining the Biology Division at a later date. Another present Division member, G. E. Stapleton, also served in the original group of Manhattan Project biologists.
- Research Organization:
- Oak Ridge National Lab. (ORNL), Oak Ridge, TN (United States)
- Sponsoring Organization:
- USDOE
- OSTI ID:
- 1603086
- Country of Publication:
- United States
- Language:
- English
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