Teller, Edward

Teller, Edward (1908–2003) Hungarian-born nuclear physicist who worked under J. Robert Oppenheimer on the Manhattan Project at Los Alamos, New Mexico after becoming a U.S. citizen in 1941. He earned a Ph.D. in physical chemistry in 1930, then studied under Niels Bohr in Copenhagen, going on to teach at the University of Göttingen from 1931 to 1933. He moved to the United States with his wife, Augusta Harkanyi, in 1935 and, after he became a U.S. citizen, he joined Enrico Fermi's team, which was trying to produce the first self-sustaining nuclear chain reaction, at the University of Chicago. Teller then accepted an invitation to work at the University of California at Berkeley with J. Robert Oppenheimer on theoretical studies on the atomic bomb. When Oppenheimer agreed to set up and head the project to build a fission bomb at Los Alamos Scientific Laboratory, Teller was among the first men recruited. In 1946, Teller returned to the University of Chicago, working at its Institute for Nuclear Studies and returning frequently to Los Alamos as a consultant. Teller wanted the United States to build a hydrogen bomb, and, in spite of the opposition of Oppenheimer, who now headed the Atomic Energy Commission, and other atomic scientists, President Harry S. Truman approved the project after the Soviet Union exploded an atomic bomb in 1949. The hydrogen bomb was tested at Eniwetok atoll in the Pacific Ocean in November 1952.

Teller played an important role in the establishment of the Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory in 1952—the United States's primary thermonuclear weapons manufacturer—and served as its associate director (1954–1958) and director (1958–1960); at the same time he taught physics at the University of California at Berkeley. A prominent advisor to United States government officials on nuclear weapons, and was a major influence in President Ronald Reagan's proposed Strategic Defense Initiative.