Chicago Pile-1

Chicago Pile 1 (English pile, stack ' ), short- CP-1, was the world's first nuclear reactor, built by people, in the 1942, the first controlled critical fission chain reaction took place.

The pilot plant was built by the Metallurgical Laboratory at the private University of Chicago and was part of the Manhattan Project, whose goal was the construction of nuclear weapons. You should confirm the theoretical expectation that a self-sustaining fission chain reaction actually occurs. The aim of the reactor development of the Manhattan Project was the production of weapons-grade plutonium from uranium -238 by neutron capture in the reactor. The Metallurgical Laboratory was under the direction of Nobel laureate Arthur Holly Compton.

Pile 1 had been built under a disused sports bleacher on campus after the work on the originally designated facility in the small town of Palos Park because of a strike could not be included. The reactor itself was about 6 feet high, approximately spherical stratification of blocks of natural uranium metal and graphite, which was constructed under the direction of the Italian physicist Enrico Fermi. It contained a critical mass of uranium and cadmium-containing control rods to control the reaction.

The unit contained rudimentary facilities for scram. For this purpose a parked for helpers would cut through the fastening rope of a hanging above the control element Pile with an ax, which would then be dropped into the reactor and would have made him subcritical. For the purpose of redundancy was a three-member team above the pile ready to flood this with a cadmium salt solution. Since then and until today the rapid shutdown of a reactor (to v. Engl scram, run away ',' take off .'' ) Is called a " scram "; Fermi himself the Backronym Safety Cut Rope Axe Man survives.

On December 2, 1942 was the first demonstration in front of invited guests. A young scientist named George Weil withdrew the control rods partially from the reactor core, while Fermi supervised the neutron count rate. The nuclear reaction started at 15:20 clock and was canceled after 33 minutes.

The facility was dismantled in February 1943 and to extend a protective apron, as Chicago Pile 2 rebuilt in the originally proposed investment site A in Palos Park. A graphite block of the plant is now on display at the Museum of Science and Industry in Chicago.