Professor Frank Close, OBE FRS, University of Oxford
Any questions, contact: alumni@physics.ox.ac.uk
Join us for a special lecture by Professor Frank Close OBE FRS on November 1st!
This is an event for general public and alumni.
"Trinity - Rudolf Peierls, Klaus Fuchs, and how the security services caught the most dangerous spy in history"
Abstract: Trinity was the codename for the test explosion of the atomic bomb in New Mexico on 16 July 1945. Frank Close tells the story of the bomb's metaphorical father, Rudolf Peierls (who was Professor here in Oxford from 1963 to his retirement in 1974); his intellectual son, the atomic spy Klaus Fuchs who worked with him in Birmingham and Los Alamos and continued spying post war from Harwell; and the ghosts of the security services in Britain, the USA and USSR. Frank will reveal new insights from MI5 files in the National Archives, and documents of the FBI and KGB. He has also overthrown a misconception lasting 60 years that J Edgar Hoover was central to Fuchs' exposure: the real hero was probably GCHQ.
The talk will be followed by a drinks reception.
Booking in advance is required.