<P> Chicago Pile - 1 ( CP - 1 ) was the world 's first nuclear reactor . On 2 December 1942 , the first human - made self - sustaining nuclear chain reaction was initiated in CP - 1 , during an experiment led by Enrico Fermi . The reactor 's development was part of the Manhattan Project , the Allied effort to create atomic bombs during World War II . It was built by the Metallurgical Laboratory at the University of Chicago , under the west viewing stands of the original Stagg Field . Fermi described the apparatus as `` a crude pile of black bricks and wooden timbers '' . </P>
<P> Chicago Pile - 1 ( CP - 1 ) was the world 's first nuclear reactor . On 2 December 1942 , the first human - made self - sustaining nuclear chain reaction was initiated in CP - 1 , during an experiment led by Enrico Fermi . The reactor 's development was part of the Manhattan Project , the Allied effort to create atomic bombs during World War II . It was built by the Metallurgical Laboratory at the University of Chicago , under the west viewing stands of the original Stagg Field . Fermi described the apparatus as `` a crude pile of black bricks and wooden timbers '' . </P>
who built the first nuclear reactor the atomic pile
who built the first nuclear reactor the atomic pile
Enrico Fermi the Metallurgical Laboratory
Enrico Fermi the Metallurgical Laboratory