!!!Meitner, Lise

b. Vienna, Nov. 7, 1878, 
d. Cambridge (United Kingdom), Oct. 27, 1968, nuclear physicist, 
studied physics and mathematics in Vienna (mainly under L.  Boltzmann 
and F.  Exner), 1906 2nd woman in the scientific faculty at the 
University of Vienna to graduate in physics. From 1906 worked in the 
field of radioactivity under S.  Meyer in Vienna, from 1907 assistant 
of O. Hahn in Berlin, with whom she discovered the element Thorium-C 
in 1908; 1912-1915 assistant of M. Planck (first female university 
assistant in Prussia), 1918 own radio-physical department at the 
Kaiser-Wilhelms-Institut. 1926 university professor in Berlin. In 1925 
proved that gamma rays appear only after nuclear fission, 1926 proof 
of transuranic elements; papers on beta disintegration. 1938 
emigration to Sweden, interpretation of nuclear fission and estimation 
of the release of energy (together with her nephew O. R.  
Frisch). From 1939 at M. Siegbahn´s institute in Stockholm, 
until 1946 member of the Nobel Institute of Physics in Stockholm; 1960 
emigration to England. Her achievements were unjustly ascribed to the 
work done for important nuclear physicists as an assistant, since she 
was instrumental in the discovery of nuclear fission. Only much later, 
in 1997, was she given her due when the chemical element 109 was 
officially named "Meitnerium".

!Publications
Der Aufbau der Atomkerne, 1935 (with M. Delbrueck); Zur 
Struktur des Atomkerns, 1949; "Looking back". Bulletin of the Atomic 
Scientists 20, 1964.

!Literature
Schoepfer des neuen Weltbildes, 1952; O. R. Frisch, 
L. M., in: Biographic Memoirs of Fellows of the Royal Society, 
1970; C. Kerner, Lise, Atomphysikerin, %%sup 3/%1987; R. L. Sime, 
L. M. A Life in Physics, 1996; NOeB; NDB.



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