A graduate of the University of Chicago, he completed his doctorate in physical organic chemistry there in 1943, and then joined the Manhattan Project's Metallurgical Laboratory.
[2] Novick was awarded a scholarship by the University of Chicago,[4] where he earned a Bachelor of Science (SB) degree in chemistry in 1940.
[5] He went to on complete his Doctor of Philosophy (PhD) there, writing his two-part 1943 thesis on "A kinetic study of the chromic acid oxidation of isopropyl alcohol" and "The iodination of fibroin".
[6][7] After completing his degree, Novick joined the Manhattan Project's Metallurgical Laboratory at the University of Chicago,[7] where he worked on the design of the nuclear reactors at the Hanford Site in Eastern Washington that were used to produce plutonium for atomic bombs.
He was then transferred to the Project's Los Alamos Laboratory in New Mexico, where he worked on the preparations for the Trinity nuclear test, witnessing the blast on July 16, 1945.
[8] He later expressed regret that he and his fellow scientists did not pay much attention to the moral and ethical issues of the use of nuclear weapons, as they were absorbed in the urgency and importance of their work, and fixated on the grim casualties lists in the newspapers.
[4] After the war ended, Novick returned to Chicago, where he worked with Herbert L. Anderson at the Manhattan Project's Argonne National Laboratory, studying the properties of tritium, an important component in nuclear weapons.
Szilard had secured a research professorship at the University of Chicago that allowed him to dabble in biology and the social sciences.
[1] Franklin W. Stahl, one of the researchers that Novick recruited, said that "I think his life's major achievement was the wisdom in which he guided this institute.
He was opposed to the Vietnam War, and at a meeting of the Arms Control Forum he was jeered by students shouting "Go back to Russia, you commies!