Alex Wellerstein


Alex Wellerstein is a historian of science at the Stevens Institute of Technology who studies the history of nuclear weapons. He is the creator of NUKEMAP.

Background

Wellerstein grew up in Stockton, California. He received a Bachelors of Arts in history from University of California, Berkeley in 2002 and a doctorate in the history of science from Harvard University in 2010. He was once a graduate fellow for the United States Department of Energy, a lecturer at Harvard University, a postdoctoral researcher at the Harvard Kennedy School, and an associate historian at the American Institute of Physics. Since 2014, he has been a professor of Science and Technology Studies at the Stevens Institute of Technology. As of August 2025, he is a visiting researcher at the Center for International Studies at Sciences Po in Paris.
In 2021, his book Restricted Data: The History of Nuclear Secrecy in the United States was published by the University of Chicago Press. In 2025, his book The Most Awful Responsibility: Truman and the Secret Struggle for Control of the Atomic Age was published by HarperCollins.

Selected publications

  • "Patenting the bomb: Nuclear weapons, intellectual property, and technological control," Isis 99, no. 1 : 57–87.
  • "Inside the Atomic Patent Office," Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists 64, no. 2 : 26–31, 60–61.
  • "From Classified to Commonplace: The Trajectory of the Hydrogen Bomb 'Secret'," Endeavour 32, no. 2 : 47–52.
  • "Die geheimen Patente – eine andere Sicht auf die Atombombe," in Atombilder: Ikongraphien des Atoms in Wissenschaft und Öffentlichkeit des 20. Jahrhundertsts, ed. Jochen Hennig and Charlotte Bigg : 159–167.
  • "States of Eugenics: Institutions and the Practices of Compulsory Sterilization in California," in Sheila Jasanoff, ed., Reframing Rights: Bioconstitutionalism in the Genetic Age : 29–58.
  • "A Tale of Openness and Secrecy: The Philadelphia Story," Physics Today 65, no. 5, 47–53.
  • "Manhattan Project," Encyclopedia for the History of Science.
  • , "The secret of the Soviet hydrogen bomb," Physics Today 70, no. 4, 40–47.
  • "John Wheeler's H-bomb Blues," Physics Today 72, no. 4 : 42–51.
  • "The Kyoto Misconception: What Truman Knew, and Didn't Know, About Hiroshima," in Michael D. Gordin and G. John Ikenberry, eds., The Age of Hiroshima : 34–55.
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