[1][2] The groundbreaking of the facility at the eastern shore of Lake Küçükçekmece to house the country's first nuclear research reactor was held in 1959.
After completion of the construction and the start of the operation of the research reactor, the official opening of the center took place on May 27, 1962 in the presence of President Cemal Gürsel.
The six main service divisions newly established are: Application of nuclear technics in industry, medicine and research such as non-destructive (NDT)tests, radiopharmasotics.
[1] After serving 15-year long for the production of radioisotopes and the neutronics experiments with the help of beam tubes, the TR-1 was shut down on September 9, 1977 as its capacity became insufficient.
The reactor with an output capacity of 5 MW, called TR-2, went into service in the same building and the existing pool after becoming criticality in December 1981.