1917-2018

Australian-born physicist Peter Thonemann was leader of the ZETA (Zero Energy Thermonuclear Assembly) project in the UK at the time of the declassification of controlled nuclear fusion research by the UK, USA and USSR in 1958.

The Sydney Morning Herald's report on the work of Peter Thonemann and his team.

Fusion, in which hydrogen atoms fuse together to produce helium and in the process some mass is converted to energy, is the power source of stars, including our Sun. Prior to this date work on controlled nuclear fusion research had been classified by these nations for fear that fusion might provide a simple way of producing large quantities of neutrons that could be used to facilitate nuclear explosions. Once it became clear that this was not feasible, declassification was agreed and fusion research became an exemplar of international research collaboration, which continues today with the ITER project under construction in France.

Peter Clive Thonemann was born in Kew, Melbourne on June 3, 1917 and grew up in comfortable circumstances. His grandfather, Julius Emil Thonemann, emigrated to Australia in 1854 and was consul to Victoria for the Austro-Hungarian Empire, 1866-79. According to a family memoir the exact reason for his emigration, and subsequent gaining of British status under Queen Victoria, is not known, but the most likely cause is considered to be political unrest in Germany. His son Frederick Emil Thonemann, born in 1860 in Melbourne, established a wool broking business, Thonemann and Lange. The business prospered and he was able to set up as a stockbroker, F. Thonemann and Sons. His many and varied business interests included Elsey Station in the Northern Territory, which became famous though the book We of the Never Never by Jeannie Gunn. Peter was born to Frederick's second wife, Mabel (from Scotland). He was the second of four children .