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64-457: The Westinghouse Atom Smasher was created due to the interest and development of physics in the early 1900s. In the year 1932, there were some major advancements in the research of nuclear physics. The technology of the particle accelerator has been categorized into three lines of research. The first started with Ernest Rutherford 's studies into the properties of atomic particles in the 1920s. Then with John D. Cockroft and Ernest Walton producing

128-748: A Māori warrior. The title became extinct upon his unexpected death in 1937. Since 1992 his portrait appears on the New Zealand one hundred-dollar note . As a youth, Rutherford made his grandmother a wooden potato masher (presumably during his school holidays); it has been held in the collection of the Royal Society since 1888. In 1900, Rutherford married Mary Georgina Newton (1876–1954), at St Paul's Anglican Church, Papanui in Christchurch . (He had become engaged to her before leaving New Zealand.) They had one daughter, Eileen Mary (1901–1930); she married

192-643: A scholarship to study at Canterbury College , University of New Zealand , between 1890 and 1894. He participated in its debating society and the Science Society. At Canterbury, he was awarded a complex BA in Latin, English, and Maths in 1892, a MA in Mathematics and Physical Science in 1893, and a BSc in Chemistry and Geology in 1894. Thereafter, he invented a new form of radio receiver, and in 1895 Rutherford

256-549: A Cambridge degree) allowed to do research at the university, and was additionally honoured to study under J. J. Thomson . With Thomson's encouragement, Rutherford detected radio waves at 0.5 miles (800 m), and briefly held the world record for the distance over which electromagnetic waves could be detected, although when he presented his results at the British Association meeting in 1896, he discovered he had been outdone by Guglielmo Marconi , whose radio waves had sent

320-418: A Van de Graaff generator can produce is limited by leakage of the charge off the upper electrode due to corona discharge and arcing . At atmospheric pressure, a Van de Graaff machine is generally limited to around 1 megavolt. Thus this instrument was installed inside a pear-shaped 65-foot tall, 30-foot diameter air tank which was pressurized during operation to 120 pounds per square inch. High pressure improved

384-422: A compressed air tank for jet engine development during the war. As the war ended, Westinghouse returned to its normal research activities, bringing back many workers and the refurbished atom smasher. It was found, however, that the iron used for the atom smasher became brittle in low temperatures and the atom smasher may have been damaged during the war. This fact was found when several Liberty ships sailed through

448-504: A large quantity of radio power in a small space, rather than transmit it to a distance. Working with deputy research director John W. Marden, Rentschler developed a reliable process for producing pure uranium metal. In 1942, Westinghouse was contracted by the University of Chicago Met Lab to produce uranium. The company successfully provided more than three tons of uranium for Chicago Pile-1, and supplied approximately 69 tons of uranium for

512-530: A message across nearly 10 miles (16 km). Again under Thomson's leadership, Rutherford worked on the conductive effects of X-rays on gases, which led to the discovery of the electron , the results first presented by Thomson in 1897. Hearing of Henri Becquerel 's experience with uranium , Rutherford started to explore its radioactivity , discovering two types that differed from X-rays in their penetrating power. Continuing his research in Canada, in 1899 he coined

576-728: A much younger Earth, based on the insufficiency of known energy sources, but Rutherford pointed out, at a lecture attended by Kelvin, that radioactivity could solve this problem. Later that year, he was elected as a member to the American Philosophical Society , and in 1907 he returned to Britain to take the chair of physics at the Victoria University of Manchester . In Manchester, Rutherford continued his work with alpha radiation. In conjunction with Hans Geiger , he developed zinc sulfide scintillation screens and ionisation chambers to count alpha particles. By dividing

640-417: A part of nitrogen nuclei (and by inference, probably other nuclei as well). Such a construction had been suspected for many years, on the basis of atomic weights that were integral multiples of that of hydrogen; see Prout's hypothesis . Hydrogen was known to be the lightest element, and its nuclei presumably the lightest nuclei. Now, because of all these considerations, Rutherford decided that a hydrogen nucleus

704-613: A proton, which he called a "hydrogen atom", when hit with α (alpha) particles. In particular, he showed that particles ejected by alpha particles colliding with hydrogen have unit charge and 1/4 the momentum of alpha particles. Rutherford returned to the Cavendish Laboratory in 1919, succeeding J. J. Thomson as the Cavendish professor and the laboratory's director, posts that he held until his death in 1937. During his tenure, Nobel prizes were awarded to James Chadwick for discovering

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768-472: A research fellow working under Rutherford, using natural alpha particles, demonstrated induced nuclear transmutation . Later, Rutherford's team, using protons from an accelerator, demonstrated artificially-induced nuclear reactions and transmutation. Rutherford died too early to see Leó Szilárd 's idea of controlled nuclear chain reactions come into being. However, a speech of Rutherford's about his artificially-induced transmutation in lithium, printed in

832-452: A sample of radioactive material of any size invariably took the same amount of time for half the sample to decay (in this case, 11 1 ⁄ 2 minutes), a phenomenon for which he coined the term " half-life ". Rutherford and Soddy published their paper "Law of Radioactive Change" to account for all their experiments. Until then, atoms were assumed to be the indestructible basis of all matter; and although Curie had suggested that radioactivity

896-559: A very small nucleus . He arrived at this theory through his discovery and interpretation of Rutherford scattering during the gold foil experiment performed by Hans Geiger and Ernest Marsden . In 1912 he invited Niels Bohr to join his lab, leading to the Bohr-Rutherford model of the atom . In 1917, he performed the first artificially induced nuclear reaction by conducting experiments in which nitrogen nuclei were bombarded with alpha particles. These experiments led him to discover

960-541: The Geiger–Marsden experiment , which demonstrated the nuclear nature of atoms by measuring the deflection of alpha particles passing through a thin gold foil. Rutherford was inspired to ask Geiger and Marsden in this experiment to look for alpha particles with very high deflection angles, which was not expected according to any theory of matter at that time. Such deflection angles, although rare, were found. Reflecting on these results in one of his last lectures Rutherford

1024-464: The atomic numbering system in 1913. Rutherford and Moseley's experiments used cathode rays to bombard various elements with streams of electrons and observed that each element responded in a consistent and distinct manner. Their research was the first to assert that each element could be defined by the properties of its inner structures – an observation that later led to the discovery of the atomic nucleus . This research led Rutherford to theorize that

1088-474: The insulating qualities of the air and reduced charge leakage, allowing the machine to achieve a voltage potential of 5 megavolts. This allowed a beam energy of 5 MeV , although it was originally hoped to reach 10 MeV . During the second world war, Westinghouse suspended fundamental research efforts, and instead focused on researching microwave radar. This is similar to how M.I.T and Harvard also began their own organizations to study radiation and radio during

1152-585: The neutron was discovered by James Chadwick in 1932. In the same year, the first controlled experiment to split the nucleus was performed by John Cockcroft and Ernest Walton , working under his direction. In honour of his scientific advancements, Rutherford was recognised as a baron of the United Kingdom. After his death in 1937, he was buried in Westminster Abbey near Charles Darwin and Isaac Newton . The chemical element rutherfordium ( 104 Rf)

1216-675: The noble gas emitted by the radioactive element thorium , a substance which was itself radioactive and would coat other substances. Once he had eliminated all the normal chemical reactions, Soddy suggested that it must be one of the inert gases, which they named thoron . This substance was later found to be Rn , an isotope of radon. They also found another substance they called Thorium X, later identified as Rn , and continued to find traces of helium. They also worked with samples of "Uranium X" ( protactinium ), from William Crookes , and radium , from Marie Curie . Rutherford further investigated thoron in conjunction with R.B. Owens and found that

1280-437: The 12 September 1933 issue of The Times , was reported by Szilárd to have been his inspiration for thinking of the possibility of a controlled energy-producing nuclear chain reaction . Rutherford's speech touched on the 1932 work of his students John Cockcroft and Ernest Walton in "splitting" lithium into alpha particles by bombardment with protons from a particle accelerator they had constructed. Rutherford realised that

1344-593: The atom smasher removed from its supports and laid on its side. Workers laid bricks to brace the fall, and tipped it over. In an email to the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette , Silversmith pronounced his continuing commitment to refurbishing and restoring the atom smasher, saying "The iconic Atom Smasher bulb survives." As of 2023, the atom smasher remains at the demolition site, exposed to the elements. Ernest Rutherford Ernest Rutherford, 1st Baron Rutherford of Nelson , (30 August 1871 – 19 October 1937),

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1408-403: The base of the machine, where the accelerated particles bombarded experimental targets placed inside the tube, inducing various nuclear reactions . The energy of the particles was measured through the gamma rays that the beam produced when its particles hit a fluorine target, which was directly related to the voltage potential between the machine's electrodes. The maximum voltage that

1472-517: The city's top 10 preservation opportunities. During 2013, plans had been discussed of the Woodland Hills School District establishing a STEM educational facility with the atom smasher as the centerpiece, but the $ 4 to $ 5 million cost was prohibitive and the project never moved forward. By 2015, the structure was in significant disrepair and was dislodged from its supports, due to vandalism and age. On January 20, 2015, Silversmith had

1536-422: The compact nucleus). Bohr adapted Rutherford's nuclear structure to be consistent with Max Planck 's quantum hypothesis. The resulting Rutherford–Bohr model was the basis for quantum mechanical atomic physics of Heisenberg which remains valid today. During World War I, Rutherford worked on a top-secret project to solve the practical problems of submarine detection. Both Rutherford and Paul Langevin suggested

1600-518: The emission of a subatomic particle that he initially called the "hydrogen atom", but later (more precisely) renamed the proton . He is also credited with developing the atomic numbering system alongside Henry Moseley . His other achievements include advancing the fields of radio communications and ultrasound technology. Rutherford became Director of the Cavendish Laboratory at the University of Cambridge in 1919. Under his leadership,

1664-467: The energy released from the split lithium atoms was enormous, but he also realised that the energy needed for the accelerator, and its essential inefficiency in splitting atoms in this fashion, made the project an impossibility as a practical source of energy (accelerator-induced fission of light elements remains too inefficient to be used in this way, even today). Rutherford's speech in part, read: We might in these processes obtain very much more energy than

1728-408: The existence of neutrons , (which he had christened in his 1920 Bakerian Lecture ), which could somehow compensate for the repelling effect of the positive charges of protons by causing an attractive nuclear force and thus keep the nuclei from flying apart, due to the repulsion between protons. The only alternative to neutrons was the existence of "nuclear electrons", which would counteract some of

1792-584: The first analysis of the distribution in time of radioactive emission, a distribution now called the Poisson distribution . Ernest Rutherford was awarded the 1908 Nobel Prize in Chemistry "for his investigations into the disintegration of the elements, and the chemistry of radioactive substances". Rutherford continued to make ground-breaking discoveries long after receiving the Nobel prize in 1908. Under his direction in 1909, Hans Geiger and Ernest Marsden performed

1856-578: The first atomic pile. Prior to becoming Director of Research in the Lamp Division, Harvey Rentschler developed a method of reducing uranium salts into metal to study possible use as a lamp filament. He found that the melting point was too low to be used and decided to shut down the project, until the atomic pile in Chicago began. The only immediate source for uranium metals was the Bloomfield facility. Rentschler

1920-547: The first nuclear disintegrations using artificially accelerated particles. The second line of research was focused on high-energy accelerators and the development of resonant acceleration. The third line of research was the invention of the betatron by Rolf Wideroe in 1923. With the discovery of the nucleus being fresh, much research was being done on how to commercialize it. The use of the particle accelerator allowed scientists to understand better how atoms, atomic nuclei, and nucleons are held together. The Westinghouse atom smasher

1984-462: The first to perform the awarded work in Canada . Rutherford's discoveries include the concept of radioactive half-life , the radioactive element radon , and the differentiation and naming of alpha and beta radiation . Together with Thomas Royds , Rutherford is credited with proving that alpha radiation is composed of helium nuclei. In 1911, he theorized that atoms have their charge concentrated in

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2048-519: The formation of the Department of Scientific and Industrial Research (DSIR) in the following year. In 1933, Rutherford was one of the two inaugural recipients of the T. K. Sidey Medal , which was established by the Royal Society of New Zealand as an award for outstanding scientific research. Additionally, Rutherford received a number of awards from the British Crown. He was knighted in 1914. He

2112-512: The freezing waters of Alaska, their exteriors began to crack and break up, causing the ships to sink due to metal failure. In 2012, the property surrounding the atom smasher was purchased by P&L Investments, LLC. The company was run by Gary Silversmith, a developer who intended to build apartments and expressed an interest in saving the smasher. In 2013, the Young Preservationists Association of Pittsburgh named it as one of

2176-573: The greatest scientists of all time", saying: In his flair for the right line of approach to a problem, as well as in the simple directness of his methods of attack, [Rutherford] often reminds us of Faraday, but he had two great advantages which Faraday did not possess, first, exuberant bodily health and energy, and second, the opportunity and capacity to direct a band of enthusiastic co-workers. Great though Faraday's output of work was, it seems to me that to match Rutherford's work in quantity as well as in quality, we must go back to Newton. In some respects he

2240-584: The highest of anyone from Nelson. When he was awarded the scholarship, he had received 580 out of 600 possible marks. After being awarded the scholarship, Havelock School presented him with a five-volume set of books titled The Peoples of the World . He studied at Nelson College between 1887 and 1889, and was head boy in 1889. He also played in the school's rugby team. He was offered a cadetship in government service, but he declined as he still had 15 months of college remaining. In 1889, after his second attempt, he won

2304-402: The hydrogen atom (at the time the least massive entity known to bear a positive charge) was a sort of "positive electron" – a component of every atomic element. It was not until 1919 that Rutherford expanded upon his theory of the "positive electron" with a series of experiments beginning shortly before the end of his time at Manchester. He found that nitrogen, and other light elements, ejected

2368-503: The interactions that hold a nucleus together. Second, he showed that α-particles colliding with nitrogen nuclei would react rather than simply bounce off. One product of the reaction was the proton; the other product was shown by Patrick Blackett , Rutherford's colleague and former student to be oxygen: Blackett was awarded the Nobel prize in 1948 for his work in perfecting the high-speed cloud chamber apparatus used to make that discovery and many others. Rutherford therefore recognised "that

2432-557: The name of gamma ray . All three of Rutherford's terms are in standard use today – other types of radioactive decay have since been discovered, but Rutherford's three types are among the most common. In 1904, Rutherford suggested that radioactivity provides a source of energy sufficient to explain the existence of the Sun for the many millions of years required for the slow biological evolution on Earth proposed by biologists such as Charles Darwin . The physicist Lord Kelvin had argued earlier for

2496-459: The neutron (in 1932), John Cockcroft and Ernest Walton for an experiment that was to be known as splitting the atom using a particle accelerator , and Edward Appleton for demonstrating the existence of the ionosphere . In 1919–1920, Rutherford continued his research on the "hydrogen atom" to confirm that alpha particles break down nitrogen nuclei and to affirm the nature of the products. This result showed Rutherford that hydrogen nuclei were

2560-604: The nucleus may increase rather than diminish in mass as the result of collisions in which the proton is expelled". Rutherford received significant recognition in his home country of New Zealand. In 1901, he earned a DSc from the University of New Zealand. In 1916, he was awarded the Hector Memorial Medal . In 1925, Rutherford called for the New Zealand Government to support education and research, which led to

2624-617: The physicist Ralph Fowler , and died during the birth of her fourth child. Rutherford's hobbies included golf and motoring . For some time before his death, Rutherford had a small hernia , which he neglected to have repaired, and it eventually became strangulated, rendering him violently ill. He had an emergency operation in London, but died in Cambridge four days later, on 19 October 1937, at age 66, of what physicians termed "intestinal paralysis". After cremation at Golders Green Crematorium , he

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2688-522: The proton charges in the nucleus, since by then it was known that nuclei had about twice the mass that could be accounted for if they were simply assembled from hydrogen nuclei (protons). But how these nuclear electrons could be trapped in the nucleus, was a mystery. In 1932, Rutherford's theory of neutrons was proved by his associate James Chadwick , who recognised neutrons immediately when they were produced by other scientists and later himself, in bombarding beryllium with alpha particles. In 1935, Chadwick

2752-521: The proton supplied, but on the average we could not expect to obtain energy in this way. It was a very poor and inefficient way of producing energy, and anyone who looked for a source of power in the transformation of the atoms was talking moonshine. But the subject was scientifically interesting because it gave insight into the atoms. The element rutherfordium , Rf, Z=104, was named in honour of Rutherford in 1997. Harvey C. Rentschler Harvey Clayton Rentschler (22 September 1880 – 23 March 1949)

2816-463: The research director at the Lamp Plant. In 1922 Rentschler, with John W. Marden, developed an important new process. In a new type of "radio furnace" that melts metals in a vacuum, Dr. Rentschler succeeded in obtaining the rare metal uranium in a solid mass for the first time. The device that accomplished this remarkable result and thereby inaugurated a new science—"radiochemistry"—was designed to focus

2880-472: The terms " alpha ray " and " beta ray " to describe these two distinct types of radiation . In 1898, Rutherford was accepted to the chair of Macdonald Professor of physics position at McGill University in Montreal, Canada, on Thomson's recommendation. From 1900 to 1903, he was joined at McGill by the young chemist Frederick Soddy ( Nobel Prize in Chemistry , 1921) for whom he set the problem of identifying

2944-517: The top and bottom of the apparatus. In the Westinghouse machine, two high-speed belts traveled up a 47-foot shaft to a mushroom-shaped electrode near the top of the bulb-shaped enclosure, where electric charges were accumulated (see cutaway schematic) . Various ions, like those generated from hydrogen gas ( protons ) or helium gas ( alpha particles ), were injected into the upper part of an accelerator tube. The high electrostatic potential between

3008-417: The top and bottom of the tube then caused these subatomic particles to accelerate to extremely high velocities as they traveled down a 17-inch-diameter evacuated cylinder 40 feet in height, which was a sealed stack of many individual glass segments that collectively composed the largest vacuum tube in the world at the time of construction. The accelerator tube ran between and parallel to the whirling belts to

3072-631: The total charge accumulated on the screen by the number counted, Rutherford determined that the charge on the alpha particle was two. In late 1907, Ernest Rutherford and Thomas Royds allowed alphas to penetrate a very thin window into an evacuated tube. As they sparked the tube into discharge , the spectrum obtained from it changed, as the alphas accumulated in the tube. Eventually, the clear spectrum of helium gas appeared, proving that alphas were at least ionised helium atoms, and probably helium nuclei. In 1910 Rutherford, with Geiger and mathematician Harry Bateman published their classic paper describing

3136-410: The use of piezoelectricity , and Rutherford successfully developed a device which measured its output. The use of piezoelectricity then became essential to the development of ultrasound as it is known today. The claim that Rutherford developed sonar , however, is a misconception, as subaquatic detection technologies utilise Langevin's transducer . Together with H.G. Moseley , Rutherford developed

3200-406: The war. The atom smasher was shut down so that Westinghouse could focus on the electronics department. Many of the contributors to the Westinghouse project moved onto find other jobs during this period of shut down, but stayed closely connected to the nuclear research that was happening during the time. Westinghouse's Lamp Division in Bloomfield, NJ began production of uranium metal which was used in

3264-490: Was a New Zealand physicist who was a pioneering researcher in both atomic and nuclear physics . He has been described as "the father of nuclear physics", and "the greatest experimentalist since Michael Faraday ". In 1908, he was awarded the Nobel Prize in Chemistry "for his investigations into the disintegration of the elements, and the chemistry of radioactive substances." He was the first Oceanian Nobel laureate, and

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3328-691: Was an American physicist, inventor, and uranium metallurgist. Rentschler graduated in 1903 with a bachelor's degree from Princeton University and in 1908 with a Ph.D. in physics from Johns Hopkins University . From 1908 to 1917 he was a professor of physics at the University of Missouri . In 1917 he began work for the Westinghouse Electric Company as a researcher at the Westinghouse Lamp Plant in Bloomfield, New Jersey and continued working there until his retirement in 1945. He became

3392-615: Was an atomic phenomenon, the idea of the atoms of radioactive substances breaking up was a radically new idea. Rutherford and Soddy demonstrated that radioactivity involved the spontaneous disintegration of atoms into other, as yet, unidentified matter. In 1903, Rutherford considered a type of radiation, discovered (but not named) by French chemist Paul Villard in 1900, as an emission from radium , and realised that this observation must represent something different from his own alpha and beta rays, due to its very much greater penetrating power. Rutherford therefore gave this third type of radiation

3456-576: Was appointed to the Order of Merit in the 1925 New Year Honours . Between 1925 and 1930, he served as President of the Royal Society , and later as president of the Academic Assistance Council which helped almost 1,000 university refugees from Germany. In 1931 was raised to Baron of the United Kingdom under the title Baron Rutherford of Nelson , decorating his coat of arms with a kiwi and

3520-470: Was asked to begin production of these metals again for this new project. He started with a crude, low-level production line using galvanized wash tubs as vessels before enlarging the project to further production. E. U. Condon as well as some other atom smasher workers, were sent to work closely on the Manhattan Project to develop uranium isotope separation techniques. The atom smasher itself was used as

3584-595: Was awarded an 1851 Research Fellowship from the Royal Commission for the Exhibition of 1851 , to travel to England for postgraduate study at the Cavendish Laboratory , University of Cambridge . In 1897, he was awarded a BA Research Degree and the Coutts-Trotter Studentship from Trinity College, Cambridge . When Rutherford began his studies at Cambridge, he was among the first 'aliens' (those without

3648-509: Was awarded the Nobel Prize in Physics for this discovery. Rutherford's four part article on the "Collision of α-particles with light atoms" he reported two additional fundamental and far reaching discoveries. First, he showed that at high angles the scattering of alpha particles from hydrogen differed from the theoretical results he himself published in 1911. These were the first results to probe

3712-715: Was five he moved to Foxhill, New Zealand, and attended Foxhill School. At age 11 in 1883, the Rutherford family moved to Havelock , a town in the Marlborough Sounds . The move was made to be closer to the flax mill Rutherford's father developed. Ernest studied at Havelock School . In 1887, on his second attempt, he won a scholarship to study at Nelson College . On his first examination attempt, he received 75 out of 130 marks for geography, 76 out of 130 for history, 101 out of 140 for English, and 200 out of 200 for arithmetic, totalling 452 out of 600 marks. With these marks, he had

3776-419: Was given the high honour of burial in Westminster Abbey , near Isaac Newton , Charles Darwin , and other illustrious British scientists. Rutherford is considered to be among the greatest scientists in history. At the opening session of the 1938 Indian Science Congress , which Rutherford had been expected to preside over before his death, astrophysicist James Jeans spoke in his place and deemed him "one of

3840-409: Was more fortunate than Newton. Rutherford was ever the happy warrior – happy in his work, happy in its outcome, and happy in its human contacts. Rutherford is known as "the father of nuclear physics" because his research, and work done under him as laboratory director, established the nuclear structure of the atom and the essential nature of radioactive decay as a nuclear process. Patrick Blackett ,

3904-498: Was named after him in 1997. Ernest Rutherford was born on 30 August 1871 in Brightwater , a town near Nelson , New Zealand. He was the fourth of twelve children of James Rutherford, an immigrant farmer and mechanic from Perth , Scotland, and his wife Martha Thompson, a schoolteacher from Hornchurch , England. Rutherford's birth certificate was mistakenly written as 'Earnest'. He was known by his family as Ern. When Rutherford

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3968-465: Was possibly a fundamental building block of all nuclei, and also possibly a new fundamental particle as well, since nothing was known to be lighter than that nucleus. Thus, confirming and extending the work of Wilhelm Wien , who in 1898 discovered the proton in streams of ionized gas , in 1920 Rutherford postulated the hydrogen nucleus to be a new particle, which he dubbed the proton . In 1921, while working with Niels Bohr, Rutherford theorized about

4032-487: Was quoted as saying: "It was quite the most incredible event that has ever happened to me in my life. It was almost as incredible as if you fired a 15-inch shell at a piece of tissue paper and it came back and hit you." It was Rutherford's interpretation of this data that led him to propose the nucleus , a very small, charged region containing much of the atom's mass. In 1912, Rutherford was joined by Niels Bohr (who postulated that electrons moved in specific orbits about

4096-433: Was the first particle accelerator built to be industrialized. The atom smasher saw little use after the end of World War II . In a Van de Graaff generator , invented in 1929 by Robert J. Van de Graaff , an endless rubber or fabric belt carries electric charges from a roller at the base of the device and deposits them inside a hollow metal electrode at the top. This causes a high voltage to develop between electrodes at

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