The MAUD Committee was a British scientific working group formed during
the Second World War to determine if an atomic bomb was feasible. The
name came from a reference by Danish physicist Niels Bohr to his
housekeeper, Maud Ray. The committee was founded in response to the
Frisch–Peierls memorandum, which argued that a small sphere of pure
uranium-235 could have the explosive power of thousands of tons of TNT.
Its chairman was George Thomson and it met at Burlington House
(pictured). Uranium enrichment, fissile materials, and the design of
nuclear reactors and nuclear weapons were examined. The research
culminated in two reports, known collectively as the MAUD Report. In
response, the British created a nuclear weapons project. The report was
made available to the United States, where it energised the American
effort, which eventually became the Manhattan Project; it was also
handed to the Soviet Union by its atomic spies, helping start the Soviet
atomic bomb project.
Read more: <https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/MAUD_Committee>
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Today's selected anniversaries:
1815:
The East Indiaman Arniston was wrecked during a storm at
Waenhuiskrans, near Cape Agulhas in South Africa, with the loss of 372
lives.
<https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Arniston_%28East_Indiaman%29>
1914:
RMS Aquitania, the last surviving four-funnel ocean liner,
departed from Liverpool on her maiden voyage to New York City.
<https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/RMS_Aquitania>
1998:
An earthquake registering 6.5 Mw struck northern Afghanistan,
killing at least 4,000 people, destroying more than 30 villages, and
leaving 45,000 people homeless in Takhar and Badakhshan Provinces.
<https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/May_1998_Afghanistan_earthquake>
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Wiktionary's word of the day:
BANANA:
(informal, humorous, derogatory, often attributively) One who objects to
the building of any structure in their neighbourhood, especially in
public policy debate.
<https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/BANANA>
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Wikiquote quote of the day:
I speak of that justice which is based solely upon human
conscience, the justice which you will rediscover deep in the conscience
of every man, even in the conscience of the child, and which translates
itself into simple equality. This justice, which is so universal but
which nevertheless, owing to the encroachments of force and to the
influence of religion, has never as yet prevailed in the world of
politics, of law, or of economics, should serve as a basis for the new
world. Without it there is no liberty, no republic, no prosperity, no
peace! It should therefore preside at all our resolutions in order that
we may effectively cooperate in establishing peace.
--Mikhail Bakunin
<https://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Mikhail_Bakunin>