Erich Rudolf Bagge (30 May 1912, in

Neustadt bei Coburg Neustadt bei Coburg (also written ''Neustadt b. Coburg'') is a town in the district of Coburg in northern Bavaria, Germany. It is situated 15 km northeast of Coburg, as its name indicates. Local subdivisions Neustadt bei Coburg is subdivid ...

– 5 June 1996, in

Kiel Kiel ( ; ) is the capital and most populous city in the northern Germany, German state of Schleswig-Holstein. With a population of around 250,000, it is Germany's largest city on the Baltic Sea. It is located on the Kieler Förde inlet of the Ba ...

) was a German scientist. Bagge, a student of

Werner Heisenberg Werner Karl Heisenberg (; ; 5 December 1901 – 1 February 1976) was a German theoretical physicist, one of the main pioneers of the theory of quantum mechanics and a principal scientist in the German nuclear program during World War II. He pub ...

for his doctorate and

Habilitation Habilitation is the highest university degree, or the procedure by which it is achieved, in Germany, France, Italy, Poland and some other European and non-English-speaking countries. The candidate fulfills a university's set criteria of excelle ...

, was engaged in German Atomic Energy research and the

German nuclear energy project Nazi Germany undertook several research programs relating to nuclear technology, including nuclear weapons and nuclear reactors, before and during World War II. These were variously called () or (). The first effort started in April 1939, ju ...

during the

Second World War World War II or the Second World War (1 September 1939 – 2 September 1945) was a World war, global conflict between two coalitions: the Allies of World War II, Allies and the Axis powers. World War II by country, Nearly all of the wo ...

. He worked as an Assistant at the

Kaiser-Wilhelm-Institut The Kaiser Wilhelm Society for the Advancement of Science () was a German scientific institution established in the German Empire in 1911. Its functions were taken over by the Max Planck Society. The Kaiser Wilhelm Society was an umbrella organi ...

für Physik in

Berlin Berlin ( ; ) is the Capital of Germany, capital and largest city of Germany, by both area and List of cities in Germany by population, population. With 3.7 million inhabitants, it has the List of cities in the European Union by population withi ...

. Bagge, who became associated professor at the University of Hamburg in 1948, was in particular involved in the usage of nuclear power for trading vessels, and he was one of the founders of the Society for the Usage of Nuclear Energy in Ship-Building and Seafare. The first German nuclear vessel, the " NS Otto Hahn", was launched in 1962. A research reactor was installed in Geesthacht near Hamburg at about the same time which has over the years formed into a center for materials research with neutrons.

Uranium enrichment

Dr. Bagge developed a gaseous

uranium Uranium is a chemical element; it has chemical symbol, symbol U and atomic number 92. It is a silvery-grey metal in the actinide series of the periodic table. A uranium atom has 92 protons and 92 electrons, of which 6 are valence electrons. Ura ...

enrichment device (''Isotopenschleuse'' or ''isotope sluice'')'German National Socialism and the Quest for Nuclear Power, 1939-49', se
pp.133-135
by Mark Walker, published by Cambridge University Press, 1992. for enriching the U-235 isotope content of uranium in 1944, using three methods; centrifugal force, electromagnetism and thermal diffusion. It was built by BAMAG-MEGUIN under the direction of

Kurt Diebner Kurt Diebner (13 May 1905 – 13 July 1964) was a German nuclear physicist who is well known for directing and administering parts of the German nuclear weapons program, a secretive program aiming to build nuclear weapons for Nazi Germany during ...

Yellowcake Yellowcake (also called urania) is a type of powdered uranium concentrate obtained from leach solutions, in an intermediate step in the processing of uranium ores. It is a step in the processing of uranium after it has been mined but before ...

uranium oxide powder was reacted with

hydrofluoric acid Hydrofluoric acid is a solution of hydrogen fluoride (HF) in water. Solutions of HF are colorless, acidic and highly corrosive. A common concentration is 49% (48–52%) but there are also stronger solutions (e.g. 70%) and pure HF has a boiling p ...

to form gaseous

uranium hexafluoride Uranium hexafluoride, sometimes called hex, is the inorganic compound with the formula . Uranium hexafluoride is a volatile, white solid that is used in enriching uranium for nuclear reactors and nuclear weapons. Preparation Uranium dioxide is co ...

. It was pumped into the sluice, which consisted of a centrifuge and spun at great speeds to fling heavier non-fissile ²³⁸U to the periphery.

Electromagnet An electromagnet is a type of magnet in which the magnetic field is produced by an electric current. Electromagnets usually consist of wire (likely copper) wound into a electromagnetic coil, coil. A current through the wire creates a magnetic ...

s helped to keep ²³⁵U nearer the core of the centrifuge. Slight heating near the bottom of the "bowl" helped ²³⁸U to migrate to the bottom whilst ²³⁵U bubbled to the top of the chamber. Uranium hexafluoride gas with an enriched content of ²³⁵U was then sluiced off the top layers. Bagge got a patent in 1955 for the isotope sluice but it never achieved any economic importance.

Detention and academia

From June to December 1945, Bagge was (together with

Walther Gerlach Walther Gerlach (1 August 1889 – 10 August 1979) was a German physicist who co-discovered, through laboratory experiment, spin quantization in a magnetic field, the Stern–Gerlach effect. The experiment was conceived by Otto Stern in 1921 an ...

Otto Hahn Otto Hahn (; 8 March 1879 – 28 July 1968) was a German chemist who was a pioneer in the field of radiochemistry. He is referred to as the father of nuclear chemistry and discoverer of nuclear fission, the science behind nuclear reactors and ...

Paul Harteck Paul Karl Maria Harteck (20 July 190222 January 1985) was an Austrian physical chemist. In 1945 under Operation Epsilon in "the big sweep" throughout Germany, Harteck was arrested by the allied British and American Armed Forces for suspicion of ...

, Horst Korsching,

Max von Laue Max Theodor Felix von Laue (; 9 October 1879 – 24 April 1960) was a German physicist who received the Nobel Prize in Physics in 1914 "for his discovery of the X-ray diffraction, diffraction of X-rays by crystals". In addition to his scientifi ...

Carl Friedrich von Weizsäcker Carl Friedrich Freiherr von Weizsäcker (; 28 June 1912 – 28 April 2007) was a German physicist and philosopher. He was the longest-living member of the team which performed nuclear research in Nazi Germany during the Second World War, un ...

, and

Karl Wirtz Karl Eugen Julius Wirtz (24 April 1910 – 12 February 1994) was a German nuclear physicist, born in Cologne. He was arrested by the allied British and American Armed Forces and incarcerated at Farm Hall for six months in 1945 under Operation E ...

) detained at

Farm Hall A farm (also called an agricultural holding) is an area of land that is devoted primarily to agricultural processes with the primary objective of producing food and other crops; it is the basic facility in food production. The name is used fo ...

near

Cambridge Cambridge ( ) is a List of cities in the United Kingdom, city and non-metropolitan district in the county of Cambridgeshire, England. It is the county town of Cambridgeshire and is located on the River Cam, north of London. As of the 2021 Unit ...

England England is a Countries of the United Kingdom, country that is part of the United Kingdom. It is located on the island of Great Britain, of which it covers about 62%, and List of islands of England, more than 100 smaller adjacent islands. It ...

. After the war, he became Professor in Hamburg, later Professor and Head of the Department of Physics at the

University of Kiel Kiel University, officially the Christian Albrecht University of Kiel, (, abbreviated CAU, known informally as Christiana Albertina) is a public research university in the city of Kiel, Germany. It was founded in 1665 as the ''Academia Holsator ...

, Germany. He was also Head of the Gesellschaft für Kernenergieverwertung in Schiffbau und Schiffahrt (GKSS) near Hamburg.

Notes

{{DEFAULTSORT:Bagge, Erich Rudolf 1912 births 1996 deaths 20th-century German physicists Nuclear program of Nazi Germany Nazi Party members Operation Epsilon Officers Crosses of the Order of Merit of the Federal Republic of Germany German nuclear physicists Academic staff of the University of Hamburg

Uranium enrichment

Detention and academia

See also

Notes