The Office of Scientific Research and Development (OSRD) was an agency of the

United States The United States of America (U.S.A. or USA), commonly known as the United States (U.S. or US) or America, is a country primarily located in North America. It consists of 50 states, a federal district, five major unincorporated territori ...

federal government created to coordinate scientific research for military purposes during

World War II World War II or the Second World War, often abbreviated as WWII or WW2, was a world war that lasted from 1939 to 1945. It involved the vast majority of the world's countries—including all of the great powers—forming two opposing ...

. Arrangements were made for its creation during May 1941, and it was created formally by Executive Order 8807 on June 28, 1941. It superseded the work of the

National Defense Research Committee The National Defense Research Committee (NDRC) was an organization created "to coordinate, supervise, and conduct scientific research on the problems underlying the development, production, and use of mechanisms and devices of warfare" in the Un ...

(NDRC), was given almost unlimited access to funding and resources, and was directed by

Vannevar Bush Vannevar Bush ( ; March 11, 1890 – June 28, 1974) was an American engineer, inventor and science administrator, who during World War II headed the U.S. Office of Scientific Research and Development (OSRD), through which almost all warti ...

, who reported only to President Franklin Delano Roosevelt. The research was widely varied, and included projects devoted to new and more accurate bombs, reliable detonators, work on the proximity fuze, guided missiles,

radar Radar is a detection system that uses radio waves to determine the distance ('' ranging''), angle, and radial velocity of objects relative to the site. It can be used to detect aircraft, ships, spacecraft, guided missiles, motor vehicles, we ...

and early-warning systems, lighter and more accurate hand weapons, more effective medical treatments (including work to make penicillin at scale, which was necessary for its use as a drug), more versatile vehicles, and, the most secret of all, the S-1 Section, which later became the

Manhattan Project The Manhattan Project was a research and development undertaking during World War II that produced the first nuclear weapons. It was led by the United States with the support of the United Kingdom and Canada. From 1942 to 1946, the project w ...

and developed the first

atomic weapon A nuclear weapon is an explosive device that derives its destructive force from nuclear reactions, either fission (fission bomb) or a combination of fission and fusion reactions ( thermonuclear bomb), producing a nuclear explosion. Both bom ...

Human experimentation

From October 1943 to October 1946, OSRD used

conscientious objectors A conscientious objector (often shortened to conchie) is an "individual who has claimed the right to refuse to perform military service" on the grounds of freedom of thought, conscience, or religion. The term has also been extended to objecti ...

from

Civilian Public Service The Civilian Public Service (CPS) was a program of the United States government that provided conscientious objectors with an alternative to military service during World War II. From 1941 to 1947, nearly 12,000 draftees, willing to serve their ...

as subjects for research of malaria, altitude pressure, life raft rations, high altitude, frostbite, psycho-acoustics, poison gas, ingestion of and exposure to seawater, temperature extremes, climate, physiological hygiene, thiamine,

bed rest Bed rest, also referred to as the rest-cure, is a medical treatment in which a person lies in bed for most of the time to try to cure an illness. Bed rest refers to voluntarily lying in bed as a treatment and not being confined to bed because of ...

and aero medicine. To study the effects of diet and nutrition,

Ancel Keys Ancel Benjamin Keys (January 26, 1904 – November 20, 2004) was an American physiologist who studied the influence of diet on health. In particular, he hypothesized that replacing dietary saturated fat with polyunsaturated fat reduces card ...

of the

University of Minnesota The University of Minnesota, formally the University of Minnesota, Twin Cities, (UMN Twin Cities, the U of M, or Minnesota) is a public land-grant research university in the Twin Cities of Minneapolis and Saint Paul, Minnesota, United States. ...

Laboratory of Physiological Hygiene placed 32 conscientious objectors on a controlled diet. For three months they were given a normal 3,200 calorie diet. This was followed by six months of an 1800 calorie diet, fewer calories than provided by the famine diet experienced by the civilian population in wartime Europe. The research documented the men's ability to maintain physical output and the psychological effects such as introversion, lethargy, irritability, and severe depression. The study then studied the men's recovery as they returned to a normal diet and regained the weight lost during the experimentation. The men indicated later they would not have volunteered for this project had they known how rigorous it would be. The OSRD was discontinued in December 1947.

References

External links

Office of Scientific Research and Development Collection
at

Library of Congress The Library of Congress (LOC) is the research library that officially serves the United States Congress and is the ''de facto'' national library of the United States. It is the oldest federal cultural institution in the country. The library ...

. Original research conducted by the U.S. and Allies during World War II- includes technical reports, memos, drawings, etc.
OSRD OSRD timeline
*Stewart, Irvin.
Organizing Scientific Research for War: The Administrative History of the Office of Scientific Research and Development
'' Boston: Little, Brown and Company, 1948. {{DEFAULTSORT:Office Of Scientific Research And Development Agencies of the United States government during World War II Nuclear history of the United States Research organizations in the United States Government agencies established in 1941 Research and development in the United States Military research of the United States Defunct agencies of the Executive Office of the President of the United States