Trained as an electrical engineer, Albert Ghiorso was drawn into nuclear physics through his work with the Manhattan Project , which built the first atomic bomb. This led to his participation over a period of thirty years in the discovery of twelve new elements--organizing and leading the effort for the last six--and in the development of the Heavy Ion Linear Accelerator and its successor, the SuperHILAC.

Ghiorso was born July 15, 1915, in Vallejo, California, one of the seven children of John and Mary Ghiorso. His father was a riveter. Ghiorso attended the University of California at Berkeley, where he received his B.S. degree in electrical engineering in 1937. He then went to work for a small electronics firm called Cyclotron Specialties Company in Moraga, California, where he designed and constructed various kinds of radio equipment. While with Cyclotron Specialties, Ghiorso engineered and built the first commercial Geiger-Mueller counters for measuring...