 Seaborg was a member of the professional chemistry fraternity Alpha Chi Sigma . As a graduate student in the 1930s Seaborg performed wet chemistry research for his advisor Gilbert Newton Lewis , and published three papers with him on the theory of acids and bases . Seaborg studied the text Applied Radiochemistry by Otto Hahn , of the Kaiser Wilhelm Institute for Chemistry in Berlin , and it had a major impact on his developing interests as a research scientist . For several years , Seaborg conducted important research in artificial radioactivity using the Lawrence cyclotron at UC Berkeley . He was excited to learn from others that nuclear fission was possible — but also chagrined , as his own research might have led him to the same discovery . 
