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X-10 Graphite

Reactor

The X-10 Graphite Reactor at Oak Ridge


National Laboratory in Oak Ridge,
Tennessee, formerly known as the Clinton
Pile and X-10 Pile, was the world's second
artificial nuclear reactor (after Enrico
Fermi's Chicago Pile-1), and the first
designed and built for continuous
operation. It was built during World War II
as part of the Manhattan Project.
X-10 Reactor, Oak Ridge National Laboratory
U.S. National Register of Historic Places
U.S. National Historic Landmark

Workers in the Graphite Reactor use a rod to push


fresh uranium slugs into the reactor's concrete
loading face.

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Location Oak Ridge National
Laboratory

Nearest city Oak Ridge, Tennessee

Coordinates 35°55′35″N 84°18′59″W

Area less than 1-acre


(0.40 ha)[1]

Built 1943

NRHP reference # 66000720

Significant dates

Added to NRHP October 15, 1966

Designated NHL December 21, 1965


X-10 Graphite Reactor
Reactor concept Research reactor
(uranium/graphite)

Designed and build by Metallurgical


Laboratory

Operational 1943 to 1963

Status Decommissioned

Main parameters of the reactor core

Fuel (fissile material) Metallic natural


uranium

Fuel state Solid (pellets)

Neutron energy spectrum Information missing

Primary control method Control rods

Primary moderator Nuclear graphite


(bricks)

Primary coolant Air


Primary coolant Air

Reactor usage

Primary use Research

Remarks The world's second


artificial nuclear
reactor.

While Chicago Pile-1 demonstrated the


feasibility of nuclear reactors, the
Manhattan Project's goal of producing
enough plutonium for atomic bombs
required reactors a thousand times as
powerful, along with facilities to
chemically separate the plutonium bred in
the reactors from uranium and fission
products. An intermediate step was
considered prudent. The next step for the
plutonium project, codenamed X-10, was
the construction of a semiworks where
techniques and procedures could be
developed and training conducted. The
centerpiece of this was the X-10 Graphite
Reactor. It was air-cooled, used nuclear
graphite as a neutron moderator, and pure
natural uranium in metal form for fuel.

DuPont commenced construction of the


plutonium semiworks at the Clinton
Engineer Works in Oak Ridge on February
2, 1943. The reactor went critical on
November 4, 1943, and produced its first
plutonium in early 1944. It supplied the
Los Alamos Laboratory with its first
significant amounts of plutonium, and its
first reactor-bred product. Studies of these
samples heavily influenced bomb design.
The reactor and chemical separation plant
provided invaluable experience for
engineers, technicians, reactor operators,
and safety officials who then moved on to
the Hanford site. X-10 operated as a
plutonium production plant until January
1945, when it was turned over to research
activities, and the production of
radioactive isotopes for scientific, medical,
industrial and agricultural uses. It was shut
down in 1963 and was designated a
National Historic Landmark in 1965.
Origins
The discovery of nuclear fission by
German chemists Otto Hahn and Fritz
Strassmann in 1938,[2] followed by its
theoretical explanation (and naming) by
Lise Meitner and Otto Frisch,[3] opened up
the possibility of a controlled nuclear chain
reaction with uranium. At Columbia
University, Enrico Fermi and Leo Szilard
began exploring how this might be done.[4]
Szilard drafted a confidential letter to the
President of the United States, Franklin D.
Roosevelt, explaining the possibility of
atomic bombs, and warning of the danger
of a German nuclear weapon project. He
convinced his old friend and collaborator
Albert Einstein to co-sign it, lending his
fame to the proposal.[5] This resulted in
support by the U.S. government for
research into nuclear fission,[6] which
became the Manhattan Project.[7]

In April 1941, the National Defense


Research Committee (NDRC) asked Arthur
Compton, a Nobel-Prize-winning physics
professor at the University of Chicago, to
report on the uranium program. His report,
submitted in May 1941, foresaw the
prospects of developing radiological
weapons, nuclear propulsion for ships, and
nuclear weapons using uranium-235 or the
recently discovered plutonium.[8] In
October he wrote another report on the
practicality of an atomic bomb.[9] Niels
Bohr and John Wheeler had theorized that
heavy isotopes with odd atomic numbers
were fissile. If so, then plutonium-239 was
likely to be.[10]

Emilio Segrè and Glenn Seaborg at the


University of California produced 28 μg of
plutonium in the 60-inch cyclotron there in
May 1941, and found that it had 1.7 times
the thermal neutron capture cross section
of uranium-235. At the time plutonium-239
had been produced in minute quantities
using cyclotrons, but it was not possible to
produce large quantities that way.[11]
Compton discussed with Eugene Wigner
from Princeton University how plutonium
might be produced in a nuclear reactor,
and with Robert Serber how the plutonium
produced in a reactor might be separated
from uranium.[9]

The final draft of Compton's November


1941 report made no mention of using
plutonium, but after discussing the latest
research with Ernest Lawrence, Compton
became convinced that a plutonium bomb
was also feasible. In December, Compton
was placed in charge of the plutonium
project,[12] which was codenamed X-10.[13]
Its objectives were to produce reactors to
convert uranium to plutonium, to find ways
to chemically separate the plutonium from
the uranium, and to design and build an
atomic bomb.[10][14] It fell to Compton to
decide which of the different types of
reactor designs the scientists should
pursue, even though a successful reactor
had not yet been built.[15] He felt that
having teams at Columbia, Princeton, the
University of Chicago and the University of
California was creating too much
duplication and not enough collaboration,
and he concentrated the work at the
Metallurgical Laboratory at the University
of Chicago.[16]
Site selection
By June 1942, the Manhattan Project had
reached the stage where the construction
of production facilities could be
contemplated. On June 25, 1942, the
Office of Scientific Research and
Development (OSRD) S-1 Executive
Committee deliberated on where they
should be located.[17] Moving directly to a
megawatt production plant looked like a
big step, given that many industrial
processes do not easily scale from the
laboratory to production size. An
intermediate step of building a pilot plant
was considered prudent.[18] For the pilot
plutonium separation plant, a site was
wanted close to the Metallurgical
Laboratory, where the research was being
carried out, but for reasons of safety and
security, it was not desirable to locate the
facilities in a densely populated area like
Chicago.[17]

Compton selected a site in the Argonne


Forest, part of the Forest Preserve District
of Cook County, about 20 miles (32 km)
southwest of Chicago. The full-scale
production facilities would be co-located
with other Manhattan Project facilities at a
still more remote location in Tennessee.[17]
Some 1,000 acres (400 ha) of land was
leased from Cook County for the pilot
facilities, while an 83,000-acre (34,000 ha)
site for the production facilities was
selected at Oak Ridge, Tennessee. By the
S-1 Executive Committee meeting on
September 13 and 14, it had become
apparent that the pilot facilities would be
too extensive for the Argonne site, so
instead a research reactor would be built
at Argonne, while the plutonium pilot
facilities (a semiworks) would be built at
the Clinton Engineer Works in
Tennessee.[19]

This site was selected on the basis of


several criteria. The plutonium pilot
facilities needed to be two to four miles
(3.2 to 6.4 km) from the site boundary and
any other installation, in case radioactive
fission products escaped. While security
and safety concerns suggested a remote
site, it still needed to be near sources of
labor, and accessible by road and rail
transportation. A mild climate that allowed
construction to proceed throughout the
year was desirable. Terrain separated by
ridges would reduce the impact of
accidental explosions, but they could not
be so steep as to complicate construction.
The substratum needed to be firm enough
to provide good foundations, but not so
rocky that it would hinder excavation work.
It needed large amounts of electrical
power (available from the Tennessee
Valley Authority) and cooling water.[17][20]
Finally, a War Department policy held that,
as a rule, munitions facilities should not be
located west of the Sierra or Cascade
Ranges, east of the Appalachian
Mountains, or within 200 miles (320 km)
of the Canadian or Mexican borders.[21]

In December, it was decided that the


plutonium production facilities would not
be built at Oak Ridge after all, but at the
even more remote Hanford Site in
Washington state. Compton and the staff
at the Metallurgical Laboratory then
reopened the question of building the
plutonium semiworks at Argonne, but the
engineers and management of DuPont,
particularly Roger Williams, the head of its
TNX Division, which was responsible for
the company's role in the Manhattan
Project, did not support this proposal.
They felt that there would be insufficient
space at Argonne, and that there were
disadvantages in having a site that was so
accessible, as they were afraid that it
would permit the research staff from the
Metallurgical Laboratory to interfere
unduly with the design and construction,
which they considered their prerogative.[22]
A better location, they felt, would be with
the remote production facilities at
Hanford. In the end a compromise was
reached.[23] On January 12, 1943,
Compton, Williams, and Brigadier General
Leslie R. Groves, Jr., the director of the
Manhattan Project, agreed that the
semiworks would be built at the Clinton
Engineer Works.[24]

Both Compton and Groves proposed that


DuPont operate the semiworks. Williams
counter-proposed that the semiworks be
operated by the Metallurgical Laboratory.
He reasoned that it would primarily be a
research and educational facility, and that
expertise was to be found at the
Metallurgical Laboratory. Compton was
shocked;[24] the Metallurgical Laboratory
was part of the University of Chicago, and
therefore the university would be operating
an industrial facility 500 miles (800 km)
from its main campus. James B. Conant
told him that Harvard University "wouldn't
touch it with a ten-foot pole",[25] but the
University of Chicago's Vice President,
Emery T. Filbey, took a different view, and
instructed Compton to accept.[26] When
University President Robert Hutchins
returned, he greeted Compton with "I see,
Arthur, that while I was gone you doubled
the size of my university".[27]
Design

Under construction

The fundamental design decisions in


building a reactor are the choice of fuel,
coolant and neutron moderator. The
choice of fuel was straightforward; only
natural uranium was available. The
decision that the reactor would use
graphite as a neutron moderator caused
little debate. Although with heavy water as
moderator the number of neutrons
produced for every one absorbed (known
as k) was 10 percent more than in the
purest graphite, heavy water would be
unavailable in sufficient quantities for at
least a year.[28] This left the choice of
coolant, over which there was much
discussion. A limiting factor was that the
fuel slugs would be clad in aluminum, so
the operating temperature of the reactor
could not exceed 200 °C (392 °F).[18] The
theoretical physicists in Wigner's group at
the Metallurgical Laboratory developed
several designs. In November 1942, the
DuPont engineers chose helium gas as the
coolant for the production plant, mainly on
the basis that it did not absorb neutrons,
but also because it was inert, which
removed the issue of corrosion.[29]

Not everyone agreed with the decision to


use helium. Szilard, in particular, was an
early proponent of using liquid bismuth;
but the major opponent was Wigner, who
argued forcefully in favor of a water-
cooled reactor design. He realized that
since water absorbed neutrons, k would be
reduced by about 3 percent, but had
sufficient confidence in his calculations
that the water-cooled reactor would still be
able to achieve criticality. From an
engineering perspective, a water-cooled
design was straightforward to design and
build, while helium posed technological
problems. Wigner's team produced a
preliminary report on water cooling,
designated CE-140 in April 1942, followed
by a more detailed one, CE-197, titled "On a
Plant with Water Cooling", in July 1942.[30]

Fermi's Chicago Pile-1 reactor, constructed


under the west viewing stands of the
original Stagg Field at the University of
Chicago, went critical on December 2,
1942. This graphite-moderated reactor
only generated up to 200 W, but it
demonstrated that k was higher than
anticipated. This not only removed most of
the objections to air-cooled and water-
cooled reactor designs, it greatly simplified
other aspects of the design. Wigner's team
submitted blueprints of a water-cooled
reactor to DuPont in January 1943. By this
time, the concerns of DuPont's engineers
about the corrosiveness of water had been
overcome by the mounting difficulties of
using helium, and all work on helium was
terminated in February. At the same time,
air cooling was chosen for the reactor at
the pilot plant.[31] Since it would be of a
quite different design from the production
reactors, the X-10 Graphite Reactor lost its
value as a prototype, but its value as a
working pilot facility remained, providing
plutonium needed for research.[32] It was
hoped that problems would be found in
time to deal with them in the production
plants. The semiworks would also be used
for training, and for developing
procedures.[18]

Construction
Although the design of the reactor was not
yet complete, DuPont began construction
of the plutonium semiworks on February 2,
1943,[33] on an isolated 112-acre (45.3 ha)
site in the Bethel Valley about 10 miles
(16 km) southwest of Oak Ridge officially
known as the X-10 area. The site included
research laboratories, a chemical
separation plant, a waste storage area, a
training facility for Hanford staff, and
administrative and support facilities that
included a laundry, cafeteria, first aid
center, and fire station. Because of the
subsequent decision to construct water-
cooled reactors at Hanford, only the
chemical separation plant operated as a
true pilot.[34][35] The semiworks eventually
became known as the Clinton
Laboratories, and was operated by the
University of Chicago as part of the
Metallurgical Project.[36]
Under construction

Construction work on the reactor had to


wait until DuPont had completed the
design. Excavation commenced on April
27, 1943. A large pocket of soft clay was
soon discovered, necessitating additional
foundations.[37] Further delays occurred
due to wartime difficulties in procuring
building materials. There was an acute
shortage of both common and skilled
labor; the contractor had only three-
quarters of the required workforce, and
there was high turnover and absenteeism,
mainly the result of poor accommodations
and difficulties in commuting. The
township of Oak Ridge was still under
construction, and barracks were built to
house workers. Special arrangements with
individual workers increased their morale
and reduced turnover. Finally, there was
unusually heavy rainfall, with 9.3 inches
(240 mm) falling in July 1943, more than
twice the average of 4.3 inches
(110 mm).[34][38]

Some 700 short tons (640 t) of graphite


blocks were purchased from National
Carbon. The construction crews began
stacking them in September 1943. Cast
uranium billets came from Metal Hydrides,
Mallinckrodt and other suppliers. These
were extruded into cylindrical slugs, and
then canned.[39] The fuel slugs were
canned to protect the uranium metal from
corrosion that would occur if it came into
contact with water, and to prevent the
venting of gaseous radioactive fission
products that might be formed when they
were irradiated. Aluminum was chosen as
it transmitted heat well but did not absorb
too many neutrons.[40] Alcoa started
canning on June 14, 1943. General Electric
and the Metallurgical Laboratory
developed a new welding technique to seal
the cans airtight, and the equipment for
this was installed in the production line at
Alcoa in October 1943.[39]

Construction commenced on the pilot


separation plant before a chemical
process for separating plutonium from
uranium had been selected. Not until May
1943 would DuPont managers decide to
use the bismuth phosphate process in
preference to one using lanthanum
fluoride.[41] The bismuth phosphate
process was devised by Stanley G.
Thompson at the University of
California.[42] Plutonium had two oxidation
states; a tetravalent (+4) state, and
hexavalent (+6) state, with different
chemical properties.[43] Bismuth
phosphate (BiPO4) was similar in its
crystalline structure to plutonium
phosphate,[44] and plutonium would be
carried with bismuth phosphate in a
solution while other elements, including
uranium, would be precipitated. The
plutonium could be switched from being in
solution to being precipitated by toggling
its oxidation state.[45] The plant consisted
of six cells, separated from each other and
the control room by thick concrete walls.
The equipment was operated from the
control room by remote control due to the
radioactivity produced by fission
products.[36] Work was completed on 26
November 1943,[46] but the plant could not
operate until the reactor started producing
irradiated uranium slugs.[34]

Operation

Loading fuel slugs

The X-10 Graphite Reactor was the world's


second artificial nuclear reactor after
Chicago Pile-1, and was the first reactor
designed and built for continuous
operation.[47] It consisted of a huge block,
24 feet (7.3 m) long on each side, of
nuclear graphite cubes, weighing around
1,500 short tons (1,400 t), that acted as a
moderator. They were surrounded by
seven feet (2.1 m) of high-density concrete
as a radiation shield.[34] In all, the reactor
was 38 feet (12 m) wide, 47 feet (14 m)
deep and 32 feet (9.8 m) high.[1] There
were 36 horizontal rows of 35 holes.
Behind each was a metal channel into
which uranium fuel slugs could be
inserted.[48] An elevator provided access to
those higher up. Only 800 (~64%) of the
channels were ever used.[1]

The reactor used cadmium-clad steel


control rods. Made from neutron-
absorbing cadmium, these could restrict
or halt the reaction. Three 8-foot (2.4 m)
rods penetrated the reactor vertically, held
in place by a clutch to form the scram
system. They were suspended from steel
cables that were wound around a drum,
and held in place by an electromagnetic
clutch. If power was lost, they would drop
into the reactor, halting it. The other four
rods were made of boron steel and
horizontally penetrated the reactor from
the north side. Two of them, known as
"shim" rods, were hydraulically controlled.
Sand-filled hydraulic accumulators could
be used in the event of a power failure.
The other two rods were driven by electric
motors.[1]

The cooling system consisted of three


electric fans running at 55,000 cubic feet
per minute (1,600 m3/min). Because they
used outside air, the reactor could be run
at a higher power level on cold days.[1][49]
After going through the reactor, the air was
filtered to remove radioactive particles
larger than 0.00004 inches (0.0010 mm) in
diameter. This took care of over 99 percent
of the radioactive particles. It was then
vented through a 200-foot (61 m)
chimney.[1] The reactor was operated from
a control room in the southeast corner on
the second floor.[1]

In September 1942, Compton asked a


physicist, Martin D. Whitaker, to form a
skeleton operating staff for X-10.[50]
Whitaker became the inaugural director of
the Clinton Laboratories,[37] as the
semiworks became officially known in
April 1943.[51] The first permanent
operating staff arrived from the
Metallurgical Laboratory in Chicago in
April 1943, by which time DuPont began
transferring its technicians to the site.
They were augmented by one hundred
technicians in uniform from the Army's
Special Engineer Detachment. By March
1944, there were some 1,500 people
working at X-10.[52]

Exterior of the Graphite Reactor at the X-10 site in Oak


Ridge in 1950

Supervised by Compton, Whitaker, and


Fermi, the reactor went critical on 4
November 1943 with about 30 short tons
(27 t) of uranium. A week later the load
was increased to 36 short tons (33 t),
raising its power generation to 500 kW,
and by the end of the month the first
500 mg of plutonium was created.[53] The
reactor normally operated around the
clock, with 10-hour weekly shutdowns for
refueling. During startup, the safety rods
and one shim rod were completely
removed. The other shim rod was inserted
at a predetermined position. When the
desired power level was reached, the
reactor was controlled by adjusting the
partly inserted shim rod.[1]
The first batch of canned slugs to be
irradiated was received on December 20,
1943, allowing the first plutonium to be
produced in early 1944.[54] The slugs used
pure metallic natural uranium, in air-tight
aluminum cans 4.1 inches (100 mm) long
and 1 inch (25 mm) in diameter. Each
channel was loaded with between 24 and
54 fuel slugs. The reactor went critical
with 30 short tons (27 t) of slugs, but in its
later life was operated with as much as 54
short tons (49 t). To load a channel, the
radiation-absorbing shield plug was
removed, and the slugs inserted manually
in the front (east) end with long rods. To
unload them, they were pushed all the way
through to the far (west) end, where they
fell onto a neoprene slab and fell down a
chute into a 20-foot-deep (6.1 m) pool of
water that acted as a radiation shield.[1]
Following weeks of underwater storage to
allow for decay in radioactivity, the slugs
were delivered to the chemical separation
building.[55]

Reactor controls
By February 1944, the reactor was
irradiating a ton of uranium every three
days. Over the next five months, the
efficiency of the separation process was
improved, with the percentage of
plutonium recovered increasing from 40 to
90 percent. Modifications over time raised
the reactor's power to 4,000 kW in July
1944.[50] Unfortunately, the effect of the
neutron poison xenon-135, one of many
fission products produced from the
uranium fuel, was not detected during the
early operation of the X-10 Graphite
Reactor. Xenon-135 subsequently caused
problems with the startup of the Hanford B
reactor that nearly halted the plutonium
project.[56]

The X-10 semiworks operated as a


plutonium production plant until January
1945, when it was turned over to research
activities. By this time, 299 batches of
irradiated slugs had been processed.[50] A
radioisotope building, a steam plant, and
other structures were added in April 1946
to support the laboratory's peacetime
educational and research missions. All
work was completed by December 1946,
adding another $1,009,000 to the cost of
construction at X-10, and bringing the total
cost to $13,041,000.[36] Operational costs
added another $22,250,000.[48]

X-10 supplied the Los Alamos Laboratory


with the first significant samples of
plutonium. Studies of these by Emilio G.
Segrè and his P-5 Group at Los Alamos
revealed that it contained impurities in the
form of the isotope plutonium-240, which
has a far higher spontaneous fission rate
than plutonium-239. This meant that it
would be highly likely that a plutonium
gun-type nuclear weapon would
predetonate and blow itself apart during
the initial formation of a critical mass.[57]
The Los Alamos Laboratory was thus
forced to turn its development efforts to
creating an implosion-type nuclear
weapon—a far more difficult feat.[58]

The X-10 chemical separation plant also


verified the Bismuth-phosphate process
that was used in the full-scale separation
facilities at Hanford. Finally, the reactor
and chemical separation plant provided
invaluable experience for engineers,
technicians, reactor operators, and safety
officials who then moved on to the
Hanford site.[55]

Peacetime use
Loading face seen on tour in 2011

After the war ended, the graphite reactor


became the first facility in the world to
produce radioactive isotopes for
peacetime use.[1][59] On August 2, 1946,
Oak Ridge National Laboratory director
Eugene Wigner presented a small
container of carbon-14 to the director of
the Barnard Free Skin and Cancer Hospital,
for medical use at the hospital in St. Louis,
Missouri. Subsequent shipments of
radioisotopes, primarily iodine-131,
phosphorus-32, carbon-14, and
molybdenum-99/technetium-99m, were for
scientific, medical, industrial and
agricultural uses.[60]

The X-10 Graphite Reactor was shut down


on November 4, 1963, after twenty years
of use.[61] It was designated a National
Historic Landmark on December 21,
1965,[1][62][63] and added to the National
Register of Historic Places on October 15,
1966.[62] In 1969 the American Society for
Metals listed it as a landmark for its
contributions to the advancement of
materials science and technology,[47] and
in 2008 it was designated as a National
Historic Chemical Landmark by the
American Chemical Society.[60] The control
room and reactor face are accessible to
the public during scheduled tours offered
through the American Museum of Science
and Energy.[64]

Similar reactors
The Brookhaven National Laboratory (BNL)
Graphite Research Reactor was the first
nuclear reactor to be constructed in the
United States following World War II.[65]
Led by Lyle Benjamin Borst, the reactor
construction began in 1947 and reached
criticality for the first time on August 22,
1950. The reactor consisted of a 700-
short-ton (640 t), 25-foot (7.6 m) cube of
graphite fueled by natural uranium.[66] Its
primary mission was applied nuclear
research in medicine, biology, chemistry,
physics and nuclear engineering.[67] One of
the most significant discoveries at this
facility was the development of production
of molybdenum-99/technetium-99m, used
today in tens of millions of medical
diagnostic procedures annually, making it
the most commonly used medical
radioisotope. The BNL Graphite Research
Reactor was shut down in 1969 and fully
decommissioned in 2012.[68]
When Britain began planning to build
nuclear reactors to produce plutonium for
weapons in 1946, it was decided to build a
pair of air-cooled graphite reactors similar
to the X-10 Graphite Reactor at Windscale.
Natural uranium was used as enriched
was not available, and similarly, graphite
was chosen as a neutron moderator
because beryllia was toxic and hard to
manufacture, while heavy water was
unavailable.[69] Use of water as a coolant
was considered, but there were concerns
about the possibility of a catastrophic
nuclear meltdown in the densely
populated British Isles if the cooling
system failed.[70] Helium was again the
preferred choice as a coolant gas, but the
main source of it was the United States,
and under the 1946 McMahon Act, the
United States would not supply it for
nuclear weapons production,[71] so, in the
end, air cooling was chosen.[72]
Construction began in September 1947,
and the two reactors became operational
in October 1950 and June 1951.[73] Both
were decommissioned after the disastrous
Windscale fire in October 1957.[74] They
would be the last major air-cooled
plutonium-producing reactors; the UK's
follow-on Magnox and AGR designs used
carbon dioxide instead.[75]
As of 2016, another reactor of similar
design to the X-10 Graphite Reactor is still
in operation, the Belgian BR-1 reactor of
the SCK•CEN, located in Mol, Belgium.[76]
Financed through the Belgian uranium
export tax, and built with the help of British
experts,[77] the 4 MW research reactor
went critical for the first time on May 11,
1956.[78][79] It is used for scientific
purposes, such as neutron activation
analysis, neutron physics experiments,
calibration of nuclear measurement
devices and the production of neutron
transmutation doped silicon.[80][81]

Notes
1. Rettig, Polly M. (December 8, 1975).
National Register of Historic Places
Inventory-Nomination: X-10 Reactor,
Graphite Reactor (pdf). National Park
Service. and Accompanying three photos,
interior, undated  (32 KB)
2. Rhodes 1986, pp. 251–254.
3. Rhodes 1986, pp. 256–263.
4. Jones 1985, pp. 8–10.
5. The Atomic Heritage Foundation.
"Einstein's Letter to Franklin D. Roosevelt" .
Archived from the original on October 27,
2012. Retrieved May 26, 2007.
6. The Atomic Heritage Foundation. "Pa,
this requires action!" . Archived from the
original on October 29, 2012. Retrieved
May 26, 2007.
7. Jones 1985, pp. 14–15.
8. Hewlett & Anderson 1962, pp. 36–38.
9. Hewlett & Anderson 1962, pp. 46–49.
10. Anderson 1975, p. 82.
11. Salvetti 2001, pp. 192–193.
12. Hewlett & Anderson 1962, pp. 50–51.
13. Jones 1985, p. 91.
14. Hewlett & Anderson 1962, pp. 54–55.
15. Hewlett & Anderson 1962, pp. 180–181.
16. Rhodes 1986, pp. 399–400.
17. Jones 1985, pp. 46–47.
18. Oak Ridge National Laboratory 1963,
pp. 3–4.
19. Jones 1985, pp. 67–72.
20. Jones 1985, p. 69.
21. Fine & Remington 1972, pp. 134–135.
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23. Holl, Hewlett & Harris 1997, pp. 20–21.
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