Ernest Walton (1903–1995) was an Irish physicist best known for his pioneering work in nuclear physics. He is particularly renowned for being one of the first scientists to split the nucleus of an atom, an achievement he accomplished in 1932 along with his colleague, John Cockcroft. This groundbreaking experiment, known as the Cockcroft-Walton experiment, involved the use of a particle accelerator to bombard lithium with protons, resulting in the fission of the lithium nuclei.
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