Suggested in 1919, the centrifugal process was first successfully performed in 1934. American scientist Jesse Beams and his team at the University of Virginia developed the process by separating two chlorine isotopes through a vacuum ultracentrifuge. It was one of the initial isotopic separation means pursued during the Manhattan Project, more particularly by Harold Urey and Karl P. Cohen,  but research was discontinued in 1944 as it was felt that the method would not produce results by the end of the war, and that other means of uranium enrichment (gaseous diffusion and electromagnetic separation) had a better chance of success in the short term. This method was successfully used in the Soviet nuclear program, making the Soviet Union the most effective supplier of enriched uranium. Franz Simon, Rudolf Peierls, Klaus Fuchs and Nicholas Kurti made important contributions to the centrifugal process. Paul Dirac also made important theoretical contributions to the centrifugal process during World War II. Dirac developed the fundamental theory of separation processes that underlies the design and analysis of modern uranium enrichment plants.
In the long term, especially with the development of the Zippe-type centrifuge, the gas centrifuge has become a very economical mode of separation, using considerably less energy than other methods and having numerous other advantages.
Research in the physical performance of centrifuges was carried out by the Pakistani scientist Abdul Qadeer Khan in the 1970s–80s, using vacuum methods for advancing the role of centrifuges in the development of nuclear fuel for Pakistan's atomic bomb. Many of the theorists working with Khan were unsure that either gaseous and enriched uranium would be feasible on time. One scientist recalled: "No one in the world has used the [gas] centrifuge method to produce military-grade uranium.... This was not going to work. He was simply wasting time." In spite of skepticism, the program was quickly proven to be feasible. Enrichment via centrifuge has been used in experimental physics, and the method was smuggled to at least three different countries by the end of the 20th century.