Los Alamos Laboratory, known as Project Y, was a secret laboratory established by the Manhattan Project and operated by the University of California during World War II.
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20 Facts About Project Y
3.
Project Y delegated the task of bomb design and research into fast neutron calculations—the key to calculations of critical mass and weapon detonation—to Gregory Breit, who was given the title of "Co-ordinator of Rapid Rupture", and Oppenheimer as an assistant.
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4.
Project Y became convinced that bomb design would require an environment where people could freely discuss problems and thereby reduce wasteful duplication of effort.
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5.
Project Y reasoned that this could best be reconciled with security by creating a central laboratory in an isolated location.
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6.
Project Y joined the Santa Fe office as a lieutenant colonel on 19 January 1943, and was promoted to colonel on 15 February.
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7.
Project Y was succeeded by Lieutenant Colonel C Whitney Ashbridge, a graduate of the Los Alamos Ranch School, in May 1943.
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8.
Project Y secured the services of Hans Bethe and Robert Bacher from the Radiation Laboratory at MIT, Edward Teller, Robert F Christy, Darol K Froman, Alvin C Graves and John H Manley and his group from the Manhattan Project's Metallurgical Laboratory, and Robert R Wilson and his group, which included Richard Feynman, that had been performing Manhattan Project research at Princeton University.
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9.
Project Y explained that while the damage done by a small explosion was proportional to the impulse, the damage from large explosions such as an atomic bomb would be determined by the peak pressure, which depends on the cube root of its energy.
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10.
Project Y visited Los Alamos from 20 September to 4 October 1943.
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11.
Project Y became a full-time staff member on 16 February 1944, becoming Parsons' deputy for implosion; McMillan became his deputy for the gun-type.
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12.
Frank Spedding's Ames Project Y had developed the Ames process, a method of producing uranium metal on an industrial scale, but Cyril Stanley Smith, the CM Division's associate leader in charge of metallurgy, was concerned about using it with highly enriched uranium due to the danger of forming a critical mass.
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13.
Project Y recruited Richard D Baker, a chemist who had worked with Spedding, and together they adapted the Ames Process for use at the Los Alamos laboratory.
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14.
Project Y saw it as a means of testing various materials in critical mass systems.
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15.
Project Y calculated that 600 grams of uranium-235 would form a critical mass in a tamper of infinite size.
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16.
Project Y Alberta, known as Project Y A, was formed in March 1945, absorbing existing groups of Parsons's O Division that were working on bomb preparation and delivery.
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17.
The 1st Technical Service Detachment, to which the personnel of Project Y Alberta were administratively assigned, was commanded by Lieutenant Colonel Peer de Silva, and provided security and housing services on Tinian.
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18.
Project Y was equipped with a special high-speed Fastax movie camera with six seconds of film in order to record the blast.
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19.
Project Y remained in the Naval Reserve, though, ultimately retiring in 1961 with the rank of captain.
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20.
Project Y had hoped that Atomic Energy Act of 1946 would be quickly passed by Congress and the wartime Manhattan Project would be superseded by a new, permanent organization.
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