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Pierre Curie was a Professor
of Physics at the Sorbonne. He was a good friend of Becquerel, who
was the head of the Physics Department at the Ecole Polytechnique
in Paris.
In 1897, Curie's young bride, Marie (Marja Sklodowska) became Becquerel's
assistant and took on the study of X-rays from uranium as her doctoral
thesis. Marie found that some of the components of uranium were
even more radioactive than uranium itself. By 1898 Pierre had abandoned
his own work to join his wife in her search for the source of the
baffling rays produced by uranium. Madame Curie called the mysterious
rays "radioactivity."
That July, the Curies announced the isolation of a radioactive
element from uranium. They named their discovery polonium (Po-210)
in honor of Marie's birthplace, Poland. Then, in December 1898,
the couple discovered yet another radioactive element from uranium
- one that glowed, gave off heat, and was much more radioactive
than uranium. The Curies named this exciting new element radium
(Ra-226). In 1903, Marie and Pierre, along with Becquerel, were
awarded the Nobel Prize in Physics for their work.
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