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National Museum of Nuclear Science & History

Edward Norris

InventorHanford, WA

Columbia University
EngineerManhattan Project Veteran

Edward Norris, an English interior decorator, played a surprising and significant role in the quest to make the gaseous diffusion process a reality.

Frustrated by the inferiority of paint spray guns, Norris developed his own spray gun and centrifugal painting machine. His most innovative development was a very fine, metal mesh.

By 1942 he had developed two sample materials better than what formally trained engineers were producing. He worked extensively with Edward Adler and eventually devised a promising method to separate uranium isotopes. While their electroplated nickel design was rejected in favor of the powered nickel design of Johnson at Kellex Corporation, it is clear Norris contributed greatly to the difficult gaseous diffusion project at a critical hour.

Edward Norris’s Timeline
19421945 Worked on the Manhattan Project in Manhattan.

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