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Whose team created plutonium in the first nuclear reactor era?

ChemistryPeriodic Table

Quick Answer

Glenn T. Seaborg and colleagues first isolated plutonium in 1940. Seaborg later helped reshape the periodic table by placing the actinides beneath the lanthanides.

The Full Story

Plutonium was first produced in 1940 by Glenn T. Seaborg, Edwin McMillan, Joseph Kennedy and Arthur Wahl. The discovery came from bombarding uranium with deuterons in a cyclotron. Seaborg later proposed the actinide series, which moved a block of heavy elements below the main table and greatly improved its structure. His work earned a Nobel Prize in Chemistry in 1951.

Key Facts

1.first isolated in 1940
2.actinide concept developed by Seaborg
3.Nobel Prize in Chemistry in 1951

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"The discovery that forced the periodic table to grow a new row"