Oppenheimer received his doctorate in 1927 and accepted professorships at the University of California, Berkeley, and the California Institute of Technology. Oppenheimer had the good fortune to be in Europe during a pivotal time in the world of physics, as European physicists were then developing the groundbreaking theory of quantum mechanics. At Cavendish, Oppenheimer realized that his talent was for theoretical, not experimental, physics, and he accepted an invitation from Max Born, director of the Institute of Theoretical Physics at the University of Göttingen, to study with him in Germany. Thomson, who had been awarded the 1906 Nobel Prize in Physics for detecting the electron, agreed to take on Oppenheimer as a student. In 1925, Oppenheimer began his graduate work in physics at Cavendish Laboratory in Cambridge, England.

Although he majored in chemistry, Oppenheimer eventually realized his true passion was the study of physics. He graduated in three years, excelling in a wide variety of subjects. Oppenheimer enrolled at Harvard in September 1922. This experience restored Oppenheimer’s health and instilled a deep love for the desert high country. From there, he took five- or six-day horseback trips in the wilderness. Robert stayed at a dude ranch 25 miles northeast of Santa Fe with high school teacher Herbert Smith as a companion and mentor. After being bedridden for months, his parents arranged for him to spend the summer of 1922 in New Mexico, a haven for health-seekers. He graduated as valedictorian of his high school class in 1921, but fell ill with a near-fatal case of dysentery and was forced to postpone enrolling at Harvard. His correspondence with the New York Mineralogical Club was so advanced that the Society invited him to deliver a lecture-not realizing that Robert was a twelve-year-old boy. His academic prowess was apparent very early on, and by the age of 10, Oppenheimer was studying minerals, physics, and chemistry. Adler also founded the Ethical Culture School, where Oppenheimer enrolled in September 1911. The progressive society placed an emphasis on social justice, civic responsibility, and secular humanism. Oppenheimer’s family was part of the Ethical Culture Society, an outgrowth of American Reform Judaism founded and led at the time by Dr. Oppenheimer was married to a botanist, Kitty.

As director of the Los Alamos Laboratory, Oppenheimer proved to be an extraordinary choice. Less than three years after Groves selected Oppenheimer to direct weapons development, the United States dropped two atomic bombs on Japan. Throughout the previous year he had been doing research on fast neutrons, calculating how much material might be needed for a bomb and how efficient it might be.Īlthough Oppenheimer had little managerial experience and some troublesome past associations with Communist causes, General Leslie Groves recognized his exceptional scientific brilliance. He is often known as the “father of the atomic bomb.”īy the time the Manhattan Project was launched in the fall of 1942, Oppenheimer was already considered an exceptional theoretical physicist and had become deeply involved in exploring the possibility of an atomic bomb. During the Manhattan Project, Oppenheimer was director of the Los Alamos Laboratory and responsible for the research and design of an atomic bomb. Robert Oppenheimer (1904-1967) was an American theoretical physicist.

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