Lawrence, Ernest Orlando
Lawrence, Ernest Orlando (1901-1958), a United States physicist. Lawrence was awarded the 1939 Nobel Prize in physics for his invention of the cyclotron in 1930-31. The cyclotron is a basic tool of nuclear research and was also used by Lawrence and his brother John, a physician, for medical and biological research.
Lawrence was born in Canton, South Dakota. He received a Ph.D. in physics from Yale University in 1925, and taught there until 1928, when he joined the University of California faculty. In 1936 he became director of the university's Radiation Laboratory. During World War II Lawrence worked on the atomic-bomb project, heading the operations for electromagnetic separation of U-235 from U-238. In 1957 he received the Enrico Fermi Award for outstanding achievement in the field of nuclear energy. In 1958 Lawrence was a United States delegate to talks at Geneva, Switzerland, on policing a possible nuclear test ban.
Chemical element 103, discovered in 1961, was named lawrencium in honor of Lawrence.