Chicago Pile-1 (CP-1) was the world’s first what?
Chicago Pile-1 final uranium slugs. Chicago Pile-1 Chicago Pile-1 (CP-1) was the world's first nuclear reactor. On 2 December 1942, the first human-made self-sustaining nuclear chain reaction was initiated in CP-1, during an experiment led by Enrico Fermi. The reactor's development was part of the Manhattan Project, the Allied effort to create atomic bombs during World War II. It was built by the Metallurgical Laboratory at the University of Chicago, under the west viewing stands of the original Stagg Field. Fermi described the apparatus as "a crude pile of black bricks and wooden timbers". The reactor was assembled in November 1942, by
Chicago Pile-1 power – about one-half watt. The shape of the pile was intended to be roughly spherical, but as work proceeded, Fermi calculated that critical mass could be achieved without finishing the entire pile as planned. In 1943, CP-1 was moved to Red Gate Woods, and reconfigured to become Chicago Pile-2 (CP-2). There, it was operated until 1954, when it was dismantled and buried. The stands at Stagg Field were demolished in August 1957; the site is now a National Historic Landmark and a Chicago Landmark. The idea of chemical chain reactions was first suggested in 1913 by the German chemist