Atomic Weapons Establishment studies

Our studies at Atomic Weapons Establishment (AWE) have confirmed that at elevated temperatures, especially when using dry inert gas conditions, there is considerable difficulty in pushing the reaction (see scheme 5) to completion.18 Moisture was found to affect the rate of the reaction and the nature of the synthesized polymer. The introduction of additional catalyst to the reaction mixture was found to aid the forward reaction. Overall, our observations suggest the existence of a complex series of reactions, possibly having distinctly different activation energies. 

Bultitude, F. W. and Morris, J. R., Laboratory Study of the Corrosion of Implants, Atomic Weapons Research Establishment, Aldermaston, England, Report GRO 44/83/29 (1969)... 

But Teller had received no concomitant administrative appointment that April, and the omission aggrieved him. He was qualified to lead the Theoretical Division Oppenheimer appointed Hans Bethe instead. He was qualified to lead a division devoted to work toward a thermonuclear fusion weapon, a Super, but no such division was established. The laboratory had decided at its opening conference, and the Lewis committee had affirmed in May, that thermonuclear research should be restricted largely to theoretical studies and held to distant second priority behind fission an atomic bomb, since it would trigger any thermonuclear arrangement, necessarily came first there was a war on and manpower was limited. 

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