Nuclear Museum Logo
Nuclear Museum Logo

National Museum of Nuclear Science & History

Robert “Bo” Jacobs

HistorianJapan

Expert
Bo Jacobs

Robert “Bo” Jacobs is an American historian of nuclear technologies and radiation technopolitics. He moved to Japan in 2006 after being hired by the Hiroshima Peace Institute.

Jacobs is currently a professor at the Hiroshima Peace Institute and the Graduate School of Peace Studies of Hiroshima City University. His work is devoted to preserving memories of people affected by radiation and studying the colonialism of Cold War nuclear testing.  

Cognizant of perpetuating cycles of colonialist exploitation, Jacobs has sought to find ways to build networks within indigenous communities affected by radiation. Jacobs has organized training sessions to teach young adults from Japan, the Marshall Islands, and other radiation-affected places how to collect oral histories and preserve community memories.

You can listen to an interview with Jacobs here.

Related Profiles

Astro Teller

Astro Teller is the co-founder of Alphabet subsidiary “X.” He is the grandson of Edward Teller, the famous physicist often considered the father of the hydrogen bomb.

Angela Creager

Princeton, NJ

Currently the Thomas M. Siebel Professor in the History of Science at Princeton University. She is also the director of the Shelby Collum Davis Center for Historical Studies and previously was the president of the History of Science Society from 2014 to 2015.

Yasuyoshi Komizo

Japan

Yasuyoshi Komizo has been the Chairperson of the Hiroshima Peace Culture Foundation since 2013. He is the former Special Assistant to the Director General of the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA).

David Holloway

David Holloway, author of Stalin and the Bomb: the Soviet Union and Atomic Energy 1939-1956, is a professor of History at Stanford University.