the atomic bomb during World War II as part of the Manhattan Project, a research and development program begun in 1942 under the Army Corps of Engineers.
The process to produce large quantities of high-purity uranium metal became known as the Ames process. One-third of the uranium metal used in the world's first controlled nuclear chain reaction was produced at Iowa State under the direction of Frank Spedding and Harley Wilhelm. The Ames Project received the Army/Navy E Award for Excellence in Production on October 12, 1945, for its work with metallic uranium as a vital war material. Today, ISU is the only university in the United States that has a U.S. Department of Energy research laboratory physically located on its campus.
=== Atanasoff–Berry Computer ===
Iowa State is the birthplace of the first electronic digital computer, starting the world's computer technology revolution. Invented by mathematics and physics professor John Atanasoff and engineering graduate student Clifford Berry during 1937–42, …
