Elizabeth Rona

Elizabeth Rona
Born	Erzsébet Róna (1890-03-20)20 March 1890 Budapest, Hungary, Austria-Hungary
Died	27 July 1981(1981-07-27) (aged 91) Oak Ridge, Tennessee, U.S.
Nationality	Hungarian American (naturalized 1948)
Other names	Elisabeth Róna
Occupation	Nuclear chemist
Years active	1914–1976
Known for	Polonium extraction and investigating radioactivity in sea water

Elizabeth Rona (20 March 1890 – 27 July 1981) was a Hungarian nuclear chemist, known for her work with radioactive isotopes. After developing an enhanced method of preparing polonium samples, she was recognized internationally as the leading expert in isotope separation and polonium preparation. Between 1914 and 1918, during her postdoctoral study with George de Hevesy, she developed a theory that the velocity of diffusion depended on the mass of the nuclides. As only a few atomic elements had been identified, her confirmation of the existence of "Uranium-Y" (now known^[1] as thorium-231) was a major contribution to nuclear chemistry. She was awarded the Haitinger Prize by the Austrian Academy of Sciences in 1933.

After immigrating to the United States in 1941, she was granted a Carnegie Fellowship to continue her research and provided technical information on her polonium extraction methods to the Manhattan Project. Later in her career, she became a nuclear chemistry professor at the Oak Ridge Institute of Nuclear Studies and after 15 years there transferred to the Institute of Marine Sciences at the University of Miami. At both Oak Ridge and Miami, she continued her work on the geochronology of seabed elements and radiometric dating. She was posthumously inducted into the Tennessee Women's Hall of Fame in 2015.