Laboratory at the University of California
in Berkeley. Lawrence invited
Robert Stone, the chief of radiology
at the University of California
Medical Center in San Francisco, to
bring cancer patients for treatment
with neutrons produced in the
Donner lab. Cancers treated with
neutrons melted away. Soon, so did
the cancer patients. Neutrons had
more energy and different biological
characteristics than high energy
X rays. Stone discontinued his treatments
until the characteristics of
neutrons could be understood better.
World War II arrived, and in quick
succession Lawrence, Stone, and
most of the leading radiation
scientists in the free world were
drawn into the Manhattan project
to develop an atomic bomb. Wartime
imperatives drive science more
strongly than peaceful objectives. But
there was an appreciation within the
Manhattan project that biological
problems were created by the physical
and chemical advances, and
after the war, the congress created
the Atomic Energy Commission to
further peaceful applications of the
new radiation science