MEITNER, Lise (1878-1968) and Otto Robert FRISCH (1904-1979). "Disintegration of Uranium by Neutrons: A New Type of Nuclear Reaction." Offprint from: Nature. Vol 143. [London: Macmillan], 1939.

First edition, rare offprint issue, of this epochal paper on nuclear fission, the publication of which led directly to the atomic bomb. In 1938 at the suggestion of Lise Meitner, Hahn and Strassmann bombarded uranium with neutrons in the expectation of producing “transuranium” elements. Instead they discovered barium isotopes among the decay products produced by the bombarded nuclei. At a loss to interpret this, the two men communicated their result by letter to Hahn’s former co-worker Lise Meitner, who had earlier fled to Stockholm to escape Nazi persecution. Meitner and her nephew Otto Frisch theorized that the uranium nucleus breaks up into two smaller nuclei through the mutual repulsion of the many protons in the uranium nucleus, which makes it behave like a droplet of water in which the surface tension has been reduced. By taking the difference between the mass of the original nucleus and the slightly smaller total mass of the two fragment nuclei, and using Einstein’s mass-energy equivalence (e = mc2), Meitner calculated the large amount of energy (equal to 200 million electron volts) that would be released during the splitting process, which she and Frisch named “fission.”

Meitner and Frisch made their epochal discovery in the first days of January 1939. To speed publication, they decided to submit a note, composed over the telephone, rather than a full article, to Nature. However, they delayed doing so until Frisch could perform further experiments to confirm their initial data. On 16 January Frisch submitted the paper to Nature and it appeared on 11 February. This paper, as well as Frisch’s follow-up and papers by Fermi (PMM 422a), von Halban et al. (PMM 422d) and H. D. Smyth (PMM 422e) were selected for inclusion in the Printing and the Mind of Man exhibition and catalogue under its entry for “The Atom Bomb.” According to RBH, no copies of the offprint issue have appeared at auction since the Richard Green sale (Christie's New York, 17 June 2008, lot 249). Norman 1487 (journal issue); PMM 422b.

Octavo (213 x 139mm). Three pages on bifolium, unbound as issued.