Learn how a tiny scientific discovery in a laboratory had enormous implications for the entire world in this clip from The Bomb. In the early 20th century, scientists probed the mysteries of the atom. With his famous equation E=mc2, Albert Einstein had established that the amount of energy contained in even a tiny piece of matter is enormous. When two German chemists accidentally discovered how to split the nucleus of an atom — a process named "fission" — physicists immediately realized that fission could release huge amounts of energy and in turn could be harnessed inside a bomb. Because this discovery happened to come at a particular time in world politics, science and world affairs led to a race to build an atomic bomb.