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plutonium

(Encyclopedia)plutonium plo͞otōˈnēəm [key], radioactive chemical element; symbol Pu; at. no. 94; mass no. of most stable isotope 244; m.p. 641℃; b.p. 3,232℃; sp. gr. 19.84 at 20℃; valence +3, +4, +5, or ...

Manhattan Project

(Encyclopedia)Manhattan Project, the wartime effort to design and build the first nuclear weapons (atomic bombs). With the discovery of fission in 1939, it became clear to scientists that certain radioactive materi...

Pu

(Encyclopedia)Pu, symbol for the element plutonium. ...

Richland

(Encyclopedia)Richland, city (1990 pop. 32,315), Benton co., S Wash., at the confluence of the Columbia and Yakima rivers, in an irrigated farm and vineyard region; inc. 1958. It is the headquarters of the U.S. Dep...

americium

(Encyclopedia)americium ămərĭˈshēəm [key], artificially produced radioactive chemical element; symbol Am; at. no. 95; mass no. of most stable isotope 243; m.p. about 1,175℃; b.p. about 2,600℃; sp. gr. 13....

Hierapolis

(Encyclopedia)Hierapolis hīərăpˈəlĭs [key], ancient city of Phrygia, W Asia Minor, 7 mi (11.3 km) N of Laodicea and on a plateau 500 ft (152 m) above the Lycus valley (in present-day Turkey). Devoted to the w...

McMillan, Edwin Mattison

(Encyclopedia)McMillan, Edwin Mattison, 1907–91, American physicist, b. Redondo Beach, Calif., grad. California Institute of Technology, 1928, Ph.D. Princeton, 1932. On the faculty of the Univ. of California from...

Semipalatinsk Test Site

(Encyclopedia)Semipalatinsk Test Site, Soviet nuclear testing site, c.6,950 sq mi (18,000 sq km), NE Kazakhstan, near the city of Kurchatov and some 90 mi (150 km) W of Semey (formerly Semipalatinsk). Between 1949 ...

Lanzhou

(Encyclopedia)Lanzhou or Lanchow both: länˈjōˈ [key], city (1994 est. pop. 1,295,600), capital of Gansu prov., W China, on the Huang He (Yellow River) at its confluence with the Wei. It is a rail, highway, and ...

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