Abstract
One-hundred-two years ago, on 21 April 1910, the Austrian chemist Carl Auer von Welsbach published a short comment on a fundamental discovery he had made in the field of nuclear sciences. He reported that “jonium” (230Th) was able to induce radioactivity in other materials if stored in contact with the ionium sample. He was well aware that this observation was “not quite in agreement with current theories”, because, as a basic principle, a radioactive substance cannot activate an inactive substance. Since he could not remove any superficial contamination, he concluded that the previously inactive materials had become radioactive themselves. Auer von Welsbach predicted that this observation “might be of importance for the mysterious field of radioactivity research”. In fact, we believe that in this experiment he incidentally discovered neutron activation and the production of artificial radionuclides (24 years before I. Curie and F. Joliot) or even induced nuclear fission. The neutron source in his experiments is yet unknown and shall be identified in this project. The neutrons could have been produced from nuclear reactions with impurities of beryllium in the sample. Auer von Welsbach may even have observed nuclear fission 29 years before O. Hahn, F. Straßmann, L. Meitner and O. R. Frisch. In any case, he may have noticed the effects of neutron radiation—22 years before its discovery by J. Chadwick. The main aim of this interdisciplinary project (of which preliminary results are presented herein) is to repeat the 1910-experiment and to identify the source of the neutrons. It will be equally important to investigate the historical reasons and circumstances why Auer’s report remained mostly uncommented in the scientific community. The hypothetical consequences are worth discussion: Auer’s publication could have started the “nuclear age” much earlier than it finally began, with all the consequences for mankind.
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Acknowledgments
We gratefully acknowledge financial support by the Austrian Academy of Sciences in the form of the Bader Award for the History of Sciences 2010 as well as the Theodor Körner Fonds in the form of the Theodor Körner Preis 2011, respectively. Further we are indebted to Ingrid Groß for her transcription of the original documents of interest as well as to Stefan Merz for his assistance in the course of the measurements.
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Steinhauser, G., Löffler, G. & Adunka, R. The possible discovery of neutron activation in 1910. J Radioanal Nucl Chem 296, 157–163 (2013). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10967-012-2065-7
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s10967-012-2065-7