Philip Abelson

Dr. Philip Abelson was a physicist on the path to discovering fission when Otto Hahn and Lisa Meitner discovered this process first. Abelson worked at the Navy Research Laboratory, where he designed pipes to enrich uranium. He discusses how he was also the first in the United States to manufacture large quantities of uranium hexafluoride. Abelson’s technology was reviewed by General Groves, Edward Teller, and Robert Oppenheimer, and then utilized at the Oak Ridge site.