Vinča Nuclear Institute  The Vinča Institute of Nuclear Sciences is a nuclear physics research institution near Belgrade, Serbia. Since its founding, the institute has also conducted research in the fields in physics, chemistry and biology. The scholarly institute is part of the University of Belgrade. The institute was established in 1948 as the Institute for Physics. Several different research groups started in the 1950s, and two research reactors were built. The institute operates two research reactors; RA and RB. The research reactors were supplied by the USSR. The larger of the two reactors was rated at 6.5 MW and used Soviet-supplied 80% enriched uranium fuel. The nuclear research program ended in 1968, while the reactors were switched off in 1984. On 15 October 1958, there was a criticality accident at one of the research reactors. Six workers received large doses of radiation; one died shortly afterwards. The other five received the first ever bone marrow transplants in Europe. Six young researchers, all between 24 and 26 years, were conducting an experiment on the reactor, and the results were to be used by one student for his thesis. At some point, they smelled the strong scent of ozone. It took them 10 minutes to discover the origin of the ozone, but by that time they were already irradiated. The news was briefly broadcast by the state agency Tanjug, but the news on the incident were then suppressed. The reasons included the position of state in the atmosphere of the Cold war division, but also a fact that the state commission concluded that the incident was caused by the carelessness and indiscipline of the researchers. The patients were first treated in Belgrade, under care of Dr. Vasa Janković. Thanks to the personal connections of the Institute director Pavle Savić, who was a collaborator of Irène and Frédéric Joliot-Curie, they were transferred to the Curie Institute in Paris. In Paris, they were treated by oncologist Georges Mathé. Five researchers were heavily radiated: Rosanda Dangubić, Života Vranić, Radojko Maksić, Draško Grujić and Stijepo Hajduković, while Živorad Bogojević received a low dose of radiation. Mathé operated on all five of them, performing the first successful allogeneic bone marrow transplant ever performed on unrelated human beings. The donors were all French: Marcel Pabion, Albert Biron, Raymond Castanier and Odette Draghi, a mother of four young children.