Implanting a Discipline: The Academic Trajectory of Nuclear Engineering in the USA and UK

Abstract

The nuclear engineer emerged as a new form of recognised technical professional between 1940 and the early 1960s as nuclear fission, the chain reaction and their applications were explored. The institutionalization of nuclear engineering-channelled into new national laboratories and corporate design offices during the decade after the war, and hurried into academic venues thereafter-proved unusually dependent on government definition and support. This paper contrasts the distinct histories of the new discipline in the USA and UK (and, more briefly, Canada). In the segregated and influential environments of institutional laboratories and factories, historical actors such as physicist Walter Zinn in the USA and industrial chemist Christopher Hinton in the UK proved influential in shaping the roles and perceptions of nuclear specialists. More broadly, I argue that the Statemanaged implantation of the new subject within further and higher education curricula was shaped strongly by distinct political and economic contexts in which secrecy, postwar prestige and differing industrial cultures were decisive factors.

Emergence of a techno-legal specialty: Animal tests to assess chemical safety in the UK, 1945–1960

“…The industrial base is more likely to promote differentiation, secrecy and fragmentation of knowledge in contrast to academic expectations of coherence, collaboration and open debate. Johnston (2009) identifies such factors in the emergence of nuclear engineering. Both Linthorst (2010) and Frickel and Moore (2006) note that these factors affect the activities of technical domains in the policy field which find it difficult to develop a shared paradigm and have an impact on scientists' autonomy (see also Lave, 2014;Lave and Doyle, 2010).…”

Discipline Continuity across Undergraduate and Graduate Degrees

“…New academic disciplines can also form in response to pressures external to academia. For example, services operations management formed because employers wanted students trained with specific skills and knowledge (Heineke and Davis, 2007); nuclear engineering formed because new government funding became available to support research in this topic (Johnston, 2009); and black studies evolved from a political movement into an academic discipline (Rojas, 2007).…”