Origins

As the father of nuclear physics,^[11] Ernest Rutherford is credited with splitting the atom in 1919.^[12] His team in England bombarded nitrogen with naturally occurring alpha particles from radioactive material and observed a proton emitted with energy higher than the alpha particle ... Read more »

As of 2005, nuclear power provided 6.3% of the world's energy and 15% of the world's electricity, with the U.S., France, and Japan together accounting for 56.5% of nuclear generated electricity.^[2] In 2007, the IAEA reported there were 439 nuclear power reactors in operation in the world, ^{... Read more »}