Otto Robert Frisch and Lise Meitner interpreted the barium found after uranium bombardment as evidence that a heavy atomic nucleus could divide into two large fragments. Their 1939 paper related the available energy to nuclear mass differences and the electrical repulsion of the fragments. This supplied a physical account of nuclear fission, connecting a chemical identification of the products with a new type of nuclear transformation and its large energy release.[ref]
Disintegration of Uranium by Neutrons: a New Type of Nuclear Reaction by Lise Meitner and Otto Robert Frisch. 1939 Nature paper, interpretation of barium and energy estimate
A physicist who worked with Lise Meitner on the interpretation of nuclear fission.[ref]
Lise Meitner im Porträt. Treffpunkt der Nobelpreisträger. Das Harnack-Haus in Berlin-Dahlem by Susanne Kiewitz; Early-January 1939 discussion: Otto Robert Frisch identified as a physicist and Meitner's collaborator
Portrait of Otto Robert Frisch
. Photograph by Emilio Segrè, courtesy AIP Emilio Segrè Visual Archives, Segrè Collection. CC BY 4.0, via Wikimedia Commons. Source.
