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Neils Bohr(1885-1962)
Neils Bohr was born in Copenhagen and was educated at the University of Copenhagen; he earned his doctorate in 1911. During that year, he worked with British physicists John Thomson and Ernest Rutherford. Bohr published his theories on atomic structure between 1913 and 1915, receiving the Nobel Prize in physics in 1922 for his work. His atomic theory relied on the quantum theory; the model showed that an atom emits radiation when an electron jumps down a quantum level. Bohr returned to the University of Copenhagen in 1916 as professor of physics, and in 1920 he became the director of Theoretical Physics. Bohr's work here lead to the idea that electrons are found in shells around the atom, and that the valence, or outer-shell electrons, determine an atom's chemical properties. In 1939 he showed that U235 was a fissile isotope of uranium, and he later worked at Los Alamos, New Mexico to develop the atomic bomb. Bohr started to make peaceful uses of atomic energy after he returned to the University of Copenhagen in 1945; he organized an Atoms for Peace Conference in Geneva in 1955. The element bohirium with atomic number 107 has been named in honor of Bohr. |