Of the prominent nuclear physicists active during the first half of the 20th century, Elise Meitner was surely one of the more prolific contributors to the field. Meitner made instrumental advances in nuclear fission and participated in the discovery of new isotopes.
Beginnings
Meitner was born in November of 1878 in Vienna to Philipp and Hedwig Meitner, both of whom had Jewish heritage. Of a scientific bent from a young age, she often studied mathematics late into the night. After she finished school, she initially taught French, which did not require a university qualification.
However, by 1899, women were allowed to seek university education through the Matura; Meitner juggled housework with her studies and passed the Matura in 1901, gaining admission into the University of Vienna at the age of 23. Meitner was the first woman to be admitted into the department of physics. She undertook an experimental project for her doctoral thesis and was awarded her doctorate on the 1st of February, 1906. She was only the second woman to receive such a degree from the university.
In 1907, Meitner went to the University of Berlin to study radioactivity. In Prussia, women were still not allowed to enroll officially for classes and required the lecturer’s permission to unofficially “audit” courses; Meitner received the same from Max Planck. Dr. Otto Hahn, a chemist well known in the field of radioactivity, approached her in the hopes of working with her. This sparked a long-lasting collaboration.
Early years: the KWI and WWI
In 1912, after years of productive collaboration, Meitner and Hahn were invited to the new Kaiser Wilhelm Institute for Physical Chemistry and Electrochemistry—he as a handsomely paid Professor and she as an unpaid guest. In the same year, however, Max Planck appointed her the first female assistant in Prussia, the beginning level of academic titles.
During the first World War, Meitner trained to be an X-ray technician and served in a unit for a year after which she continued her research in Berlin while most scientists and technicians were on active military duty. In 1917, she and Hahn published together a paper describing their discovery of a new element, the “mother substance” of actinium. Though others had observed different isotopes of the same element before, Meitner received priority for naming since she had found the most stable isotope. As per her wishes, the element was named protactinium.
After the first World War, Meitner continued at the KWI, this time working in beta radiation. She received the title Privatdozentin (an academic qualification) after becoming the first woman to be awarded a habilitation in physics in Prussia. In 1926, she became the first woman in Germany to receive the title Professor.
Breakthrough: Nuclear fission and WWII
During Hitler’s rise to power, Meitner’s position was complicated by her Jewish heritage. She was dismissed from the University of Berlin in 1933, though permitted to continue her research work (albeit in an increasingly hostile political climate). She and Hahn, along with Fritz Strassmann and Meitner’s nephew Otto Frisch, made significant progress in nuclear physics. However, when Austria was annexed by Germany in 1938, Meitner lost her status as a foreign national, compromising her further. In July, Hahn and her other friends managed to smuggle her out of Berlin into the Netherlands, from where she travelled to join Niels Bohr in Copenhagen and then on to Stockholm.
Hahn and Strassmann continued the experiments they had been conducting prior to Meitner’s flight and sent their findings of a “bursting” of a nucleus to her. In exile, she and Frisch first came up with and then demonstrated their theory of nuclear fission. Hahn and Strassmann, the chemists, published two papers in January and February of 1939, while Meitner and Frisch, the physicists, published their own results just after. These papers were seminal in nuclear physics and chemistry.
The 1944 Nobel Prize in Chemistry was awarded to Otto Hahn for the discovery of nuclear fission. No prize in either physics or chemistry was ever awarded to Meitner, despite her invaluable contribution to the discovery; even now many believe that the exclusion of Meitner was “a careless decision”.
Twilight years
During and after the second World War, Meitner continued to work in physics in the institute of Manne Siegbahn, where she was something of an interloper amongst unsympathetic colleagues. She later moved to the Royal Institute of Technology in Sweden, with the salary but not the title of Professor, and eventually retired to the UK in 1960. Lise Meitner passed away in her sleep on the 27th of October, 1968.
Lise Meitner is revered and remembered today as one of the most prominent figures in her field. She was nominated 49 times for the Nobel Prizes in physics and chemistry (but never won an award). She has an element named solely after her; Meitnerium is the only element thus far to honour a woman this way. Her work continues to guide scientific exploration, and her contributions have been immortalised in the history of physics.
“I always arrived at the conclusion that life need not be easy provided only it was not empty.”
~ Lise Meitner, Looking Back
