The Legacy of Hiroshima

' EDWARD TELLER (1908 – 2003) was a Hungarian-American theoretical physicist who is known colloquially as the father of the hydrogen bomb. He made numerous contributions to nuclear and molecular physics, spectroscopy (in particular the Jahn–Teller and Renner–Teller effects), and surface physics. Teller was born in Hungary and emigrated to the United States in the 1930s. He was an early member of the Manhattan Project, charged with developing the first atomic bomb; during this time he made a serious push to develop the first fusion-based weapons as well, but these were deferred until after World War II. In 1986, he was awarded the United States Military Academy's Sylvanus Thayer Award. He was elected a member of the U.S. National Academy of Sciences in 1948. He was a fellow of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences, the American Association for the Advancement of Science, and the American Nuclear Society. Among the honors he received were the Albert Einstein Award in 1958, the Enrico Fermi Award in 1962, the Eringen Medal in 1980, the Harvey Prize in 1975, the National Medal of Science in 1983, and the Presidential Citizens Medal in 1989.'