Chemistry Division-
Livermore
At Livermore, the Chemistry Division devoted approximately 50
percent of its activity to scientific support of weapon projects.
More than half of the remaining effort supported Pluto, Sherwood,
and Plowshare programs. The D ivision was comprised of three major
groups.
In 1958, Radiochemistry consisted of 40 people; Chemical
Engineering had 60 members; and General Chemistry had approximately 70 persons.
In 1967, the department consisted of four
groups totalling 370 members:
on explosives),
Process
General Chemistry (including work
and Materials Development
study of irradiation effects on materials);
porting LRL��s Weapons,
grams);
Plowshare,
and Refractory Materials.
Reactor,
(including
Radiochemistry (sup-
and Biomedical Pro-
Radicchemists diagnosed nuclear detonations by conducting
analyses of radioactive debris gathered in the bomb clouds.
Mounted with filters, test aircraft gathered debris an hour or
two after the detonation.
The filters were flown back to the
Livermore Laboratory where the radioactive particles were placed
in a homogeneous
solution,
followed by the long process
lyzing the fission products and tracers.
of
ana-
Radiochemistry under-
took a program to devise a method of sampling nuclear clouds with
rocket aircraft sampling,
to
radiation.
and eliminated exposure of the air crew
With the resumption of nuclear testing in 1962, the Radiochemistry section
made diagnostic measurements of all LRL tests and
devised methods for sampling bomb debris from both underground
and atmospheric tests.
One of the most ambitious experiments was
the measurement of neutron-capture sections of uranium, thorium,
hafnium, and gold emitted in the Plowshare Gnome event near
Carlsbad, New Mexico in December 1961.
In 1969,
a chemical processing facility was constructed for decontamination of radioactive gases released from underground nuclear explosions in Mis-
sissippi and for separation of heavy elements produced in under-
ground nuclear explosions at
General Chemistry
explosives.
the NTS.
investigated the chemical
reactions of
Process and Materials Development studied iradiation
effects on rock and metal deformation and polymers.
A major
activity of the Chemical Engineering group was the development of
chemical procedures
to contain radioactive materials,
including
the operation of a chemical processing facility to decontaminate
radioactive gases from underground explosions.
A second important activity at Livermore was the separation and identification
of heavy elements produced in underground nulcear explosions a
the NTS.
Within Process and Materials, the
oped materials from uranium, thorium,
for the Weapons Program, and tungsten
Programs.
Plastics Section developed
cations.
Metallurgy Section develberyllium, and their alloys
and rhenium for the Reactor
plastics for weapons appli-