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Niobium is a chemical element with symbol Nb and atomic number 41. A rare, soft, grey, ductile transition metal, niobium is found in the minerals pyrochlore (the main source for niobium) and columbite. Niobium has similar physical and chemical properties to another element, tantalum, and the two are therefore difficult to distinguish. The German chemist Heinrich Rose determined in 1846 that tantalum ores contain a second element, which he named niobium, after Niobe from Greek mythology. It was not until the early 20th century that niobium was first used commercially. Brazil is the leading producer of niobium and ferroniobium, an alloy of niobium and iron. Niobium is used mostly in alloys, the largest part in special steel such as that used in gas pipelines. Although alloys contain only a maximum of 0.1%, that small percentage improves the strength of the steel. The temperature stability of niobium-containing superalloys is important for its use in jet engines and rocket engines. Niobium is used in various superconducting materials. These superconducting alloys, also containing titanium and tin, are widely used in MRI scanners. Other applications of niobium include its use in welding, nuclear industries, electronics, optics, numismatics and jewellery. In the last two applications, niobium's low toxicity and ability to be coloured by anodisation are particular advantages.

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J. Robert Oppenheimer (April 22, 1904 – February 18, 1967) was an American theoretical physicist and professor of physics at the University of California, Berkeley. He is best known for his role as the scientific director of the Manhattan Project: the World War II effort to develop the first nuclear weapons at the secret Los Alamos National Laboratory in New Mexico. For this reason he is remembered as "the father of the atomic bomb". In reference to the Trinity test in New Mexico, where his Los Alamos team first tested the bomb, Oppenheimer famously recalled the Bhagavad Gita: "If the radiance of a thousand suns were to burst at once into the sky, that would be like the splendor of the mighty one." and "Now I am become Death, the destroyer of worlds."