Arguably more influential than his investigations into “disintegration of the elements and the chemistry of radioactive substances” that were recognized with the 1908 Nobel Prize in Chemistry is the work spawned by Rutherford’s exploration of alpha ray interactions with light elements, hydrogen, oxygen and nitrogen.  In 1919, the latter result surprised the world by revealing the proton, by establishing artificial transmutation, and by revealing nuclear fusion reactions to the scientific world.  Rutherford’s discovery essentially catalyzed an explosion of developments, many controversial, in nuclear science, a two decade old field which at the time was still very puzzling.  Rutherford’s powerful insight foreshadowed the hypothesis of the neutron in 1920 as a neutral proton/electron doublet and the extension of nuclear reaction studies to neutron capture and copious energy release.   An early advocate of accelerators, Rutherford by 1927 was urging his students to develop means of producing higher energy bombarding particles.  Tracing the many developments germinated by Rutherford’s 1919 discovery, we will conclude with the apt fusion of californium and the three-alpha cluster, carbon-12, to produce the eponymous rutherfordium, element 104, a half century later.

4He + 14N --> 18F*: What comes next?

2019 Fall National Meeting

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