Robert R. Wilson

Early in his career as a scientist, Robert R. Wilson declared that all wars are evil and that he would not do research for any "futile, immoral war." But news of Nazi horrors coupled with his own scientific curiosity led Wilson to amend his moral stance in the initial years of World War II. Being a nuclear physicist, he became intrigued with fission. He learned that the work in fission was being directed toward the construction of an atomic weapon. With reservations, Wilson joined the Manhattan Project, but convinced himself that he would eventually use his discoveries in helping develop energy sources that would prove beneficial to humanity. Wilson invented a method of separating the rare uranium-235 isotope from the more commonly occurring uranium-238. Separating out uranium-235 was very important in making the atomic bomb. As his work...