Yuli Khariton; Helped Build Soviet Atomic Bomb

Yuli Khariton, 92, a Russian scientist who helped build the first Soviet atomic bomb. Khariton studied nuclear fission and earned a doctorate at Cavendish Laboratory at Britain’s Cambridge University. In 1943, he joined a team of scientists, led by Igor Kurchatov, who were ordered to develop nuclear weapons. The group developed the first Soviet atomic bomb, which was tested Aug. 29, 1949. In 1951, Khariton created and then led the nuclear weapons research center Arzamas-16, now known as Sarov. He won the highest Soviet medal, the Hero of Socialist Labor, three times and received the Lenin Prize. On Thursday in Sarov, Russia.