German-born American physicist who shared the Nobel Prize for Physics
in 1925 with Gustav Hertz for research on the excitation and ionization
of atoms by electron bombardment that verified the quantized nature
of energy transfer.
Franck was appointed professor of physics at the University of Gottingen in 1920. In protest against Nazi policies he resigned his post and went to Denmark (1933). Arriving in the United States in 1935, Franck was appointed professor at Johns Hopkins University, Baltimore, and in 1938 became professor of physical chemistry at the University of Chicago.
Franck's researches in the fields of photochemistry and atomic physics
included determinations from molecular band spectra of the energy involved
in the dissociation of molecules. During World War II he worked on the
Manhattan Project, which developed the atomic bomb. Franck became a
leader of those scientists in the Manhattan Project who sought to stop
the bomb's use against Japan; they instead suggested that the bomb be
exploded in an unpopulated area to demonstrate its power to the Japanese
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