Thesis (Ph. D.)--Virginia Polytechnic Institute and State University, 1998. / Vita. Abstract. Author's abstract: Adapting Thomas P. Hughes's "large technological systems" thesis, I focus on the technical, social, political, and human problems that nuclear weapons scientists faced while pursuing the thermonuclear project, demonstrating why the early American thermonuclear bomb project was an immensely complicated scientific and technological undertaking. I concentrate mainly on Los Alamos Scientific Laboratory's Theoretical, or T, Division, and its members' attempts to complete an accurate mathematical treatment of the "Super"--The most difficult problem in physics in the postwar period -- and other fusion weapon theories. Although tackling a theoretical problem, theoreticians had to address technical and engineering issues as well. I demonstrate the relative value and importance of H-bomb research over time in the postwar era to scientific, politician, and military participants in this project. I analyze how and when participants in the H-bomb project recognized both blatant and subtle problems facing the project, how scientists solved them, and the relationship this process had to official nuclear weapons policies. Consequently, I show how the practice of nuclear weapons science in the postwar period became an extremely complex, technologically-based endeavor. "LA-13577-T thesis, issued July 1999." Includes bibliographical references. Also available online via Internet.
| Identifer | oai:union.ndltd.org:OCLC/oai:xtcat.oclc.org:OCLCNo/76786558 |
| Date | January 1900 |
| Creators | Fitzpatrick, Anne. |
| Publisher | [Los Alamos, N.M. : Los Alamos National Laboratory, |
| Source Sets | OCLC |
| Language | English |
| Detected Language | English |
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