Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1957-03-14
Danish Physicist Wins
First Atoms Peace Prize

4 NEW YORK, Mar. IA (P).-
Danish Atomic Physicist Niels
Bohr is the winner of the first
$4,000 Atoms for Peace Award
set up as memorial to Henry
and EdSel Ford.
The award to Prof. Bohr, II,
was announced yesterday by
James R. Killian, jr., chairman
of the trustees of Atoms for
Peace. Inc, a nonprofit corpora
ton financed by the Ford Motor
! Co Fund.
Prof. Bohr won the Nobel Prize
in physics in 1922. Since 1920
he has been director of the In
stitute of Theoretical Physics at
Copenhagen,
DR.. Killian said the selection
was unanimous. after conSidera-
ton of the names of rs persons
from % countries.
Telegram From President
! DR.. Killian released a tele-
gram sent to the board by Pres
ident Eisenhower, which said in
part:
! Seldom has a man dedicated
himself more single-mindedly to-
the search of knowledge for the
benefit of mankind than has
Prof. Bohr in his half century
as a scientist and teacher"
4 The award stems from an APP
peal by Mr.. Eisenhower to bust
ness and professional men in
June, 1850. to provide an incen-
tive for finding ways to utilize
atomic science for peaceful pur-
poses. The Ford Fund allotted
an annual appropriation of $780,
900 for 10 years.
DR.. Killian said Prof. Bohr
has indicated he will come to
this country to receive the award
and a gold medallion at cere-
monies in Cambridge. Mass, this
spring.
Prof. Bohr. a native of Copen-
hagen. earned his electorate in
physics at the University of
Copenhagen in 1911 and the next
year went to England to work
with Ernest Rutherford at the
University of Manchester. DR..
Rutherford had just established
that the atom has dense nu-
cleus with positive charge which
occupies only a small portion of
the atom; and that, surround
ing this dense nucleus, there are
electrons of negative charge in
sufficient number TO balance it's
positive charge.
Even at that time. scientists
were accommodating comprehen-
Sive and exact data about the
energy radiated by atoms in the
form of light. Certain relation
ships in the radiation energies
of different atoms had been
found. but there existed no ade-
quate theory to explain these
relationships. Prof. Bohr, in a
series Of papers published in
1913, offered a theoretical ex-
PLANTATION for the radiation phe-
nomena; he postulated that the
electrons moving around the nu-
cleus are confined to restricted
orbits.
Clarifies Basic Principles
In these and later papers he
clarified the basic principles of
quantum theory. 1t has been
stated that these contributions
were IAN essential prerequisite
for the magnificent advance in
this field Of physics" For his
services in the Investigation of
the structure Of atoms and of
the radiation emanating from
them. Prof. Bohr was awarded
the Nobel Prize in Physics in
1922.
In 1916 Prof Bohr was APP
pointed to the chair of theoreti-
cal physics at the University of
Copenhagen. On his initiative
the Institute for Theoretical
Physics was opened there. He
has been its only director.
In 1886 Prof. Bohr, turning
his interest to nuclear physics,
proposed his immensely fruitful
theory of nuclear reaction which
successfully interpreted the ex-
periments Of Enrico Fermi and
others on the interaction of neu-
irons with nuclei.
During a visit TO the Institute
for Advanced Studies in Prince
ton, N. j., in 1899, Prof. Bohr.
in collaboration with J. A.
Wheeler. contributed to the I'M
derstanding of the nuclear fis-
sion observations of Otto Hahn
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