Wikipedia
Gaseous diffusion is a technology used to produce enriched uranium by forcing gaseous uranium hexafluoride (UF) through semipermeable membranes. This produces a slight separation between the molecules containing uranium-235 (U) and uranium-238 (U). By use of a large cascade of many stages, high separations can be achieved. It was the first process to be developed that was capable of producing enriched uranium in industrially useful quantities.
Gaseous diffusion was devised by Francis Simon and Nicholas Kurti at the Clarendon Laboratory in 1940, tasked by the MAUD Committee with finding a method for separating uranium-235 from uranium-238 in order to produce a bomb for the British Tube Alloys project. The prototype gaseous diffusion equipment itself was manufactured by Metropolitan-Vickers (MetroVick) at Trafford Park, Manchester, at a cost of £150,000 for four units. This work was later transferred to the United States when the Tube Alloys project became subsumed by the later Manhattan Project.
Usage examples of "gaseous diffusion".
For the sake of diversity he sat down from time to time, and once he ran completely through in his head Part Two of the Gaseous Diffusion Process-the difference between U-235 and U-238.
It tried centrifuges, tried laser-isotope separation, gaseous diffusion, ion exchange, and electromagnetic isotope separation (EMIS), among other routes.
We're a mining town from way back, and we can refine the stuff, too, by gaseous diffusion, mass spectrography, mass chromatography, whatev-er's asked.
Six months ago they had been so confident of victory, the gaseous diffusion plant was online and within two years enough weapons-grade uranium would be separated to make the first bomb .