Today Is June 27

The world's first nuclear power station was opened at Obninsk near Moscow. It began producing electricity on June 27, 1954.

Obninsk Nuclear Power Plant Museum By RIA Novosti archive, image #409173 / Pavel Bykov

Hungarian-born physicist Leo Szilard conceived of the idea of the nuclear chain reaction while waiting for a traffic light on Southampton Row in Bloomsbury, London in September 1933.

German chemist Otto Hahn discovered the nuclear fission of the heavy element uranium, the scientific and technological basis of nuclear energy in December 1938. The decisive experiment was named "radium-barium-mesothorium-fractionation."

In December 1942 a group of scientists achieved the first self-sustaining chain reaction and thereby initiated the controlled release of nuclear energy. Leo Szilard, who had emigrated to America was among the observers.