Vannevar Bush becomes director of the United
States Office of Scientific Research and Development where he directed such programs as the mass production
of sulfa drugs and penicillin, the development of the atomic bomb,
and the perfection of radar. As part of the latter effort,
Karl Lark-Horowitz , Seymour Benzer , and others developed germanium
crystal rectifiers, the semiconducter later used in transistors.
Atomic bomb development was known as the Manhattan Project with
Oppenheimer in overall charge of the scientists involved.