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April 10, 1965 NATURE ATOM

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April 10, 1965 NATURE ATOM No. 49so April 10, 1965 NATURE 123 Since, quite apart from financial considerations, there world picture. Written from the British perspective _all;d must be some relation between the output of different largely from documents only in GDvernment files, Bnta~n categories of trained manpower and national needs and and Atomic Energy 1939-1945 brings to light many _n~w opportunities, it would seem wise to proceed circumspectly and, in some ways, extraordinary facts about British with university expansion pending the enquiry into the activities in the early 1940's. For one who has investigated this early history from reasons for the shortage of candidates in science and documents available in the United States, the most technology and the institution of appropriate measures to important revelation in Mrs. GDwing's book is the extent deal with the situation which themselves may well require of British accomplishment before the summer of 1941. time to take effect. There are some suggestive passages in I knew that the optimistic conclusions of the Maud this connexion in the recent presidential report of Dr. Report in the summer of 1941 had sparked the first real Caryl Haskins to the Carnegie Institution of Washington effort to investigate the possibilities of an atomic weapon (see Nature, 206, I, 1965), and while some attention to in the United States; but I had never imagined that the the content of university courses, to transfer between physical principles on which that Report was based were courses, and perhaps to more flexibility in the subjects understood by some scientists in Britain as early as February 1940. required for entry may be desirable, any relaxation of Mrs. GDwing describes the early and well-founded university standards would be most unwise. If it did not scepticism which dominated British t~inking in 193~. result at once in higher wastage, it could adversely affect Especially after the outbreak of war m September, It university teaching and offset any potential improvements seemed unlikely that atomic energy could play any part in the actual teaching-if it did not also lead ultimately in the impending conflict. Some scientists, like ~tto to lower standards of professional competence. A note Frisch, questioned whether a bomb would be poss_Ible on failure rates and university standards in Australia by even if some isotope separation process could be devised 235 Prof. J. M. Blatt in Vestes for December 1964 fully sub­ to accomplish a ten-fold enr~chmen~ of the .U con~ent stantiates this view. in natural uranium. Then, m argmng the pomt, Fnsch began to have some doubts about its. validitY:. _With It seems probable from this report that the real problem Rudolph Peierls he explored the theoretical possibility of lies in the schools themselves. It is useless to blame the a weapon using pure uranium-235. This proved the key school-leaver, who largely takes his or her ideas as to a to the problem. In a short paper, Peierls and Frisch career from a careers master or mistress, from a particular summarized their theoretical calculations, which showed teacher, from parents or from the general image of a that a weapon could be made with as little as 1 kg of profession or career in the public mind. It is here that uranium-235, and suggested the rapid assembly ?f sub­ critical masses of uranium as the method for firmg the immediate correction could be applied, and this calls bomb. The document, reproduced in the appendix, is especially for the co-operation of professional institutions unfortunately undated, but it must have been written as well as of the schools and education authorities. There early in 1940. is no reason to believe-all the evidence is to the contrary Did the British delay conveymg this mformat10n to -that the youth of to-day is reluctant to enter scientific American scientists for almost eighteen months ? (No copy of the memorandum has been found in United States or technological careers to the extent that is needed if files.) How could such an oversight have. occurred, the opportunities and rewards of those careers are accur­ especially in view of British concern at the tune about ately and imaginatively presented-this is not to deny, the lack of urgency and direction in the American pro­ however, that there are some where the prospects, the gramme ? Part of the answer may lie in _the lac~ of status or the financial rewards require some improvement. administrative machinery for the exchange of mformatiOn, part in the understandable reluctance to commit oneself on the basis of theory alone. But there are also traces of national pride and a lack of confidence in foreign security BRITISH PERSPECTIVE ON THE systems within the structure of an otherwise remark- ably co-operative Anglo-American. alliance. ATOM Such motives operated on both sides of the Atlantic, as Britain and Atomic Energy 1939-1945 both the American and the British volumes make clear. By Margaret GDwing. With an introductory chapter by Some Americans were pleased to find convenient reasnos Kenneth Jay. Pp. xvi+464+ 14 plates. (London: for terminating interchange in 1943; but, as Mrs. GDwing Macmillan and Co., Ltd.; New York: St. Martin's Press, points out, the British brought some of this on them­ Inc., 1964.) 55s. net. selves. Grossly underestimating the electric effect o~ ~he Maud Report on the American programme, the Bntish EW accomplishments in science have had more hesitated in accepting American proposals for a fully F immediate and profound impact than the discovery joint effort. By the time the British had decided to act of nuclear fission by Hahn and Strassmann in late 1938. in July 1942, American confidence had increased to the As the startling news from Germany swept across the point that full co-operation with the British no longer world, scientists in many countries rushed to their seemed necessary. laboratories to verify the incredible report. Within seven Thus Mrs. Gowing sets the stage for a careful descnp­ years technology transformed the Hahn-Strassmann tion of the ups and down of the alliance during the War: experiment into a matter of consequence for all nations, the collapse of collaboration in late 1942, Churchill's but only recently have we begtm to assemble an adequate appeals to Roosevelt for a resumption of interchange, history of that transformation. consideration of an independent British programme, the To be sure, the American effort was widely publicized negotiation of the Quebec Agreement ill; the summer of by the Smyth Report, which appeared shortly after 1943 the British missions to tho Umted States and the dramatic introduction of atomic energy into world Cana:da, the controversy over tho French scientists, and affairs in August 1945. Further details were released in the Hyde Park aide-memoire of 1944. 1962 in The New World, the first volume of a history of In describing these episodes, Mrs. Gowmg gives us a the U.S. Atomic Energy Commission. But in the absence glimpse of the human reactions behind the official fanade. of historical records, achievements in the other nations We learn, for example, how "shocked" the British were have been neglected. Now we have Mrs. Gowing's to receive James Conant's memorandum of January 1943 splendid volume, which fills an indispensable part in the outlining a restrictive policy for interchange, how © 1965 Nature Publishing Group 124 NATURE April 10, 1965 voL. 2os "bewildered" they were by the American charge that the latter, and it is to these that he quickly turns following Britain's desire for interchange was motivated by an a brief review, on conventional lines, of various aspects of interest in post-war commercial applications of atomic the internal field. energy. We see for the first time the full dimensions of The systematic 'solar daily' and 'lunar daily' variations Prime Minister Churchill's dissatisfaction with the efforts are first summarily dealt with. Their accepted physical of Prof. Niels Bohr to initiate with the Russians some explanation as a type of dynamo action, produced by frank discussion of international control of atomic energy; diurnal motions of the conducting high atmosphere across and we have here, incidentally, the first public release of the Earth's magnetic field, is outlined. The complicating the full text of the Hyde Park aide-memoire, expressing factors of a vertical component of electromotive force the concern of Roosevelt and Churchill that Bohr's (atmospheric tidal motion) and of anisotropy of iono­ activities might result in a leak of information to the spheric conductivity caused by the presence of the Earth's Russians. field are also briefly discussed. All this new information will prove invaluable to his­ The book is primarily concerned with the sporadic torians and others who wish to understand the Anglo­ ('disturbance' or 'storm') variations. The author reviews American atomic alliance with its problems and accom­ their categorization and analysis, their representation by plishments. It is essential in evaluating the British atmospheric electric currents and their relationship with contribution to the war-time programme. What is more, solar activity. He also discusses the physical process of Mrs. Gowing tells her story well, with an engaging frank­ emission of a solar particle 'stream' (in his nomenclature ness and reserve. a long-lived process from a disturbed solar region) and In comparison with these attributes, any criticism will of a 'shell' (short-lived, in association with a solar flare) seem petty. I cannot help but mention the lack of source and the geometrical and thermal expansion to which these citations from Government files. Their absence is the are subject as they move outwards from the Sun. Two price the author had to pay for writing contemporary points, in particular, appear worthy of comment.
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