Known as the 'Father of the H-bomb'.

Tellard graduated in chemical engineering at Karlsruhe before studying theoretical physics at Munich and Gottingen, and at Copenhagen with Niels Bohr.

Leaving Germany in 1933, Teller lectured in London and Washington before working on the Manhattan atom bomb project (1941-46). He then joined Robert Oppenheimer's theoretical study group at Berkeley, California and was appointed Director of the Livermore nuclear laboratories from 1958 to 1960.

After the USSR's first atomic test in 1949, Teller became one of the architects of the USA's programme to test (in 1952) the world's first hydrogen bomb.

Teller always repudiated any moral implications of his work, arguing that had it not been for Robert Oppenheimer's opposition, the USA might have developed the hydrogen bomb as early as 1947.