In simple terms, that assertion is correct, but for those with an expertise in the field, the longer answer to who did it ...

Later, he and his team conducted experiments in Manchester between 1914 and 1919, which have been described as being the first to "split the atom". He blasted beams of radioactive particles into ...

Sir Ernest Rutherford has been called the 'father of nuclear physics' [Getty Images] ...

Credited with splitting the nucleus of an atom during experiments at the U.K.'s Manchester University in 1917, Rutherford was "the first to artificially induce a nuclear reaction by bombarding ...

He was the first to artificially induce a nuclear reaction by bombarding nitrogen nuclei with alpha particles." The term "splitting the atom" isn't the most descriptive way of explaining what ...