Irving Kaplan, 1912- , B.A., M.A. 1934, Ph.D. in chemistry, 1937, Columbia University, was a staff member of the Manhattan Project which developed the first atomic bomb during World War II. He was a physicist in the Division of War Research at Columbia University, 1941-1946, and worked on nuclear reactor design at the University of Chicago in 1943. In 1945 he was one of the founding members of the Federation of American Scientists, a group that supported the creation of the Atomic Energy Commission. In 1947 he joined the staff of the Brookhaven National Laboratories, where he helped organize the nuclear engineering department. In 1957 he became a visiting professor of nuclear engineering at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. He was appointed professor in 1958 and helped found the Department of Nuclear Engineering in July of the same year. He was also involved in the planning of the Technology Studies Program in the MIT Department of Humanities and taught courses in the history of science and in classical Greek language and literature. His research has focused on theoretical and experimental nuclear reactor physics and design.