Wigner, Eugene Paul
Wigner, Eugene Paul (1902-1995), a Hungarian-American physicist. He received the 1958 Enrico Fermi Award for his work in developing nuclear reactors and shared the Nobel Prize in physics in 1963 for his contributions to nuclear and theoretical physics during the preceding 30 years, especially his research on the structure of the atomic nucleus.
Wigner was born in Budapest, Hungary. He received a Ph.D. in chemical engineering from the Technische Hochschule, Berlin, in 1925. In 1930 he came to the United States and joined the Princeton University faculty. He became a United States citizen in 1937. In 1938 he was named professor of mathematical physics. Wigner helped to secure government support for nuclear fission research. During World War II, he was assigned to the plutonium project at the University of Chicago. After working at Clinton Laboratories in Tennessee, 1946-47, Wigner returned to Princeton. He retired in 1971.