Marie And Pierre
Curie
There are exciting, original books, and then there is
"Radioactive: Marie & Pierre Curie, A Tale of Love
and Fallout" -- a book so astonishingly inventive that the cover is both a
joke and a metaphor.
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Marie
and Pierre Curie were two geniuses destined for each other. He was
French, born into an academic and medical family who recognised his genius
early and had the good sense not to send him to school where they felt his
spirit would be squashed. She came from a poor Polish family in a time of
Russian occupation. Her life was one of great struggle to make ends meet,
especially after her mother died when she was just 9 years old.
Marie was brilliant, but potential academic achievement was to take the back burner while she helped to support the family, working as a governess. All the children were brilliant and Marie vowed to use her earnings to fund higher education for her older sister. And so she put off her own ambitions to see her sister on her feet. As circumstances improved, the time finally came for Marie to have a turn and she enrolled at the Sorbonne, the most academically prestigious institute of the time. She was awarded a scholarship which she repaid in full upon graduation so someone else could benefit from it.
As a student, Marie took first place honours in Physics and Chemistry and was in the process of deciding her doctoral thesis when a chain of coincidences brought her into the circle of Pierre. He was older, in his mid thirties, and had despaired of ever finding a suitably intelligent companion in life. It so happened that Marie was introduced to her future husband at a time when she had an engineering contract and was after a particular technology that Pierre had recently invented, to do with exact measurement of electrical currents. They chatted at a dinner party of a mutual friend and just did not want to stop chatting. They were not only kindred spirits - their minds matched each other's perfectly. They kept on seeing each other to discuss projects. And then they kept seeing each other because they could not bear to be apart.
There is so much I admire about this couple. They had a spirit of voluntary poverty. They were totally dedicated to their work. They lived with very little and that did them just fine. And they worked hard. Marie had decided to do her doctoral thesis on radioactivity, a recently discovered phenomenon in uranium. Marie posed herself questions such as, "Are other elements also radioactive?" And, "Is it just the uranium itself that is radioactive, or could there be other trace elements causing radioactivity?" So her first experiments tested samples of uranium pitch blend to see if they returned consistent readings. They did not!
The Curie's dilemma was always the need for a laboratory. Not until after they had won two Nobel prizes were they conceded one. These experiments that so revolutionised the world of medicine were conducted in a ramshackle wooden shack that had an ineffective heater and a roof that leaked. Marie's first experiments concluded that there must be other radioactive substances within uranium pitch blend besides uranium. She optimistically hoped that it might be as much as 1% of the uranium!
To find out, she pursued uranium pitch blend, and because it was not the currently useful stuff, she got it for just the cost of delivering it. It was literally dumped in a big pile outside the shed, some 20 tonnes of it. This material was wheeled by barrow into the shed a few kilos at a time by Marie. It took four years of this sifting and refining work to extract a single gram of radium.
Meanwhile, Pierre had discovered another radioactive element - polonium. And later, actinium. These were in even more minute traces than the radium. Throughout those long years, Pierre used to say, "I hope it has a pretty colour."
The new element did not show its colour in the daylight. So the couple went home, had tea, put their baby daughter to bed, called in Pierre's father to babysit, then snuck out in the dark, went into the shed and sat looking at their discovery glow in the dark like lights on a Christmas tree.
Radium! Its properties were stupefying. Its rays penetrated the hardest and most opaque matter. Only a thick screen of lead seemed capable of stopping the insidious rays in their invisible flight.
It defied the known theories of the atomic world. In just one hour it produced a quantity of heat capable of melting its own weight of ice. If it was protected against external cold it grew warmer, and its temperature would go up as much as ten degrees centigrade or more above that of the surrounding atmosphere.
It spontaneously produced a gas which was also active and destroyed itself clearly even when enclosed in a glass tube.
It was luminous.
It made an impression on photographic plates through black paper; it made the atmosphere a conductor of electricity and thus discharged electroscopes at a distance; it coloured the glass receivers which had the honour of containing it with mauve and violet; it corroded and, little, by little, reduced to powder the paper of the cottonwool in which it was wrapped.
It gave phosphorescence to a large number of bodies incapable of emitting light by their own means. Diamonds could be made phosphorescent by the action of radium.
And it was contagious. Whatever came into even remote contact with it acquired radioactivity also.
But the most important quality of all was to be in the treatment of cancer. It could reduce and eradicate tumours and enable the surrounding tissue to grow back.
Radium was the new buzz word and became interesting to all sorts of people for all sorts of reasons. It became of immense financial interest. Pierre did not want to have to discuss this with his wife, but he did so as a matter of courtesy. They could patent the extraction methods. They would live in financial comfort for the rest of their lives. Marie's response - No way! It belongs to the whole world. They shared their knowledge with whoever wanted it.
And so they continued to live poor and hard working. For a long time unrecognised in France, they were recognised everywhere else. They were awarded prize after prize. At one glittering function to which they wore their same old shabby clothes, Pierre whispered to Marie, "How many laboratories do you think those diamond necklaces would buy?"
Then in 1903 came Nobel Prize number one which they were both awarded. A large part of the money was given to Marie's sister and brother in law for their new sanitorium.
Tragedy came not long after. Pierre was knocked down in the street by a horsedrawn carriage he had not seen. The carriage went right over his skull and crushed him.
Marie was devastated in that hidden and restricted way she had. She kept his blood stained clothes for a long time. She talked to him via her diary. And she continued his work.
What to do with her, was the concern of the scientific and academic world. Pierre had been appointed as head of the Physics Department at the Sorbonne. It was decided Marie should take his place.
The first lecture was packed. People queued out the door and down the street. She took off exactly at the point where Pierre had left off. And on she battled, adjusting her family's circumstances and working to support her two young daughters and PIerre's father.
A second Nobel Prize was awarded and then war broke out. At this time, the French had actually conceded her a laboratory and even better - an Institute of Radium. She did not want it to suffer in the war and so she opted to send her daughters overseas but stay behind in Paris to protect her and Pierre's work.
This woman was simply amazing. She thought to herself, "How can we make x ray facilities available in a mobile way for the army surgeons?" And she fitted out a car, using the current from the motor to activate the machinery. She would drive it around the army surgical stations and train people to operate it. Then go back to Paris and get another one. Doctors just raved about it. With these x ray cars they could pinpoint the exact location of a piece of shrapnel and extract it without having to search for it.
The world owes much to Marie and Pierre Curie, to their gift of intelligence, to their dedication to science and to sharing their discoveries freely with the world. Over and over again this couple could have selfishly obtained financial advantage from their discoveries. But they steadfastly refused to. The original gramme of radium would be worth a million francs at least. Marie donated it instead.
The Curies enabled one another to achieve greatness. Their love had a life of its own that gave so much to others. Their entertainments were home grown and close to nature - bike rides and hikes in the forest. They took nothing for themselves and gave to the world its first cancer treatment, its first x ray units and three Nobel Prizes as their daughter Irene also was awarded one. Truly, a great love story!
Marie was brilliant, but potential academic achievement was to take the back burner while she helped to support the family, working as a governess. All the children were brilliant and Marie vowed to use her earnings to fund higher education for her older sister. And so she put off her own ambitions to see her sister on her feet. As circumstances improved, the time finally came for Marie to have a turn and she enrolled at the Sorbonne, the most academically prestigious institute of the time. She was awarded a scholarship which she repaid in full upon graduation so someone else could benefit from it.
As a student, Marie took first place honours in Physics and Chemistry and was in the process of deciding her doctoral thesis when a chain of coincidences brought her into the circle of Pierre. He was older, in his mid thirties, and had despaired of ever finding a suitably intelligent companion in life. It so happened that Marie was introduced to her future husband at a time when she had an engineering contract and was after a particular technology that Pierre had recently invented, to do with exact measurement of electrical currents. They chatted at a dinner party of a mutual friend and just did not want to stop chatting. They were not only kindred spirits - their minds matched each other's perfectly. They kept on seeing each other to discuss projects. And then they kept seeing each other because they could not bear to be apart.
There is so much I admire about this couple. They had a spirit of voluntary poverty. They were totally dedicated to their work. They lived with very little and that did them just fine. And they worked hard. Marie had decided to do her doctoral thesis on radioactivity, a recently discovered phenomenon in uranium. Marie posed herself questions such as, "Are other elements also radioactive?" And, "Is it just the uranium itself that is radioactive, or could there be other trace elements causing radioactivity?" So her first experiments tested samples of uranium pitch blend to see if they returned consistent readings. They did not!
The Curie's dilemma was always the need for a laboratory. Not until after they had won two Nobel prizes were they conceded one. These experiments that so revolutionised the world of medicine were conducted in a ramshackle wooden shack that had an ineffective heater and a roof that leaked. Marie's first experiments concluded that there must be other radioactive substances within uranium pitch blend besides uranium. She optimistically hoped that it might be as much as 1% of the uranium!
To find out, she pursued uranium pitch blend, and because it was not the currently useful stuff, she got it for just the cost of delivering it. It was literally dumped in a big pile outside the shed, some 20 tonnes of it. This material was wheeled by barrow into the shed a few kilos at a time by Marie. It took four years of this sifting and refining work to extract a single gram of radium.
Meanwhile, Pierre had discovered another radioactive element - polonium. And later, actinium. These were in even more minute traces than the radium. Throughout those long years, Pierre used to say, "I hope it has a pretty colour."
The new element did not show its colour in the daylight. So the couple went home, had tea, put their baby daughter to bed, called in Pierre's father to babysit, then snuck out in the dark, went into the shed and sat looking at their discovery glow in the dark like lights on a Christmas tree.
Radium! Its properties were stupefying. Its rays penetrated the hardest and most opaque matter. Only a thick screen of lead seemed capable of stopping the insidious rays in their invisible flight.
It defied the known theories of the atomic world. In just one hour it produced a quantity of heat capable of melting its own weight of ice. If it was protected against external cold it grew warmer, and its temperature would go up as much as ten degrees centigrade or more above that of the surrounding atmosphere.
It spontaneously produced a gas which was also active and destroyed itself clearly even when enclosed in a glass tube.
It was luminous.
It made an impression on photographic plates through black paper; it made the atmosphere a conductor of electricity and thus discharged electroscopes at a distance; it coloured the glass receivers which had the honour of containing it with mauve and violet; it corroded and, little, by little, reduced to powder the paper of the cottonwool in which it was wrapped.
It gave phosphorescence to a large number of bodies incapable of emitting light by their own means. Diamonds could be made phosphorescent by the action of radium.
And it was contagious. Whatever came into even remote contact with it acquired radioactivity also.
But the most important quality of all was to be in the treatment of cancer. It could reduce and eradicate tumours and enable the surrounding tissue to grow back.
Radium was the new buzz word and became interesting to all sorts of people for all sorts of reasons. It became of immense financial interest. Pierre did not want to have to discuss this with his wife, but he did so as a matter of courtesy. They could patent the extraction methods. They would live in financial comfort for the rest of their lives. Marie's response - No way! It belongs to the whole world. They shared their knowledge with whoever wanted it.
And so they continued to live poor and hard working. For a long time unrecognised in France, they were recognised everywhere else. They were awarded prize after prize. At one glittering function to which they wore their same old shabby clothes, Pierre whispered to Marie, "How many laboratories do you think those diamond necklaces would buy?"
Then in 1903 came Nobel Prize number one which they were both awarded. A large part of the money was given to Marie's sister and brother in law for their new sanitorium.
Tragedy came not long after. Pierre was knocked down in the street by a horsedrawn carriage he had not seen. The carriage went right over his skull and crushed him.
Marie was devastated in that hidden and restricted way she had. She kept his blood stained clothes for a long time. She talked to him via her diary. And she continued his work.
What to do with her, was the concern of the scientific and academic world. Pierre had been appointed as head of the Physics Department at the Sorbonne. It was decided Marie should take his place.
The first lecture was packed. People queued out the door and down the street. She took off exactly at the point where Pierre had left off. And on she battled, adjusting her family's circumstances and working to support her two young daughters and PIerre's father.
A second Nobel Prize was awarded and then war broke out. At this time, the French had actually conceded her a laboratory and even better - an Institute of Radium. She did not want it to suffer in the war and so she opted to send her daughters overseas but stay behind in Paris to protect her and Pierre's work.
This woman was simply amazing. She thought to herself, "How can we make x ray facilities available in a mobile way for the army surgeons?" And she fitted out a car, using the current from the motor to activate the machinery. She would drive it around the army surgical stations and train people to operate it. Then go back to Paris and get another one. Doctors just raved about it. With these x ray cars they could pinpoint the exact location of a piece of shrapnel and extract it without having to search for it.
The world owes much to Marie and Pierre Curie, to their gift of intelligence, to their dedication to science and to sharing their discoveries freely with the world. Over and over again this couple could have selfishly obtained financial advantage from their discoveries. But they steadfastly refused to. The original gramme of radium would be worth a million francs at least. Marie donated it instead.
The Curies enabled one another to achieve greatness. Their love had a life of its own that gave so much to others. Their entertainments were home grown and close to nature - bike rides and hikes in the forest. They took nothing for themselves and gave to the world its first cancer treatment, its first x ray units and three Nobel Prizes as their daughter Irene also was awarded one. Truly, a great love story!
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Image
Renowned physicist Pierre Curie (1859 – 1906) shared more than a house and bed with his wife Marie: in 1903 they shared the Nobel Prize. Born in Poland, Marie Sklodovska was not only young and charming, but also Pierre’s intellectual equal. The following letter contains one of his many marriage proposals, which she initially refused. Eventually, however, he won her heart and they were married in 1895.
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