Marie and Irene Curie, Mother and Daughter, Two Ladies, Three Nobel Awards

Scientific Technical Review, 2017,Vol.67,No.2,pp.3-12 3 UDK: 62:929 CURIE I; CURIE M. COSATI: 07-02, 18-08, 18-02 Marie and Irene Curie, Mother and Daughter, Two Ladies, Three Nobel Awards Miroslav Jandrić1) Dimitrije Dimić2) It has been 150 years since Marie was born, and 120 years since Irene was born, mother and daughter Curie, two ladies who dedicated their lives to science and were awarded three Nobel prizes. Marie Sklodowska Curie was not only the first female to receive the Nobel award, but also the first person to receive the award two times, and the only women to receive the awards for two different areas of science (physics and chemistry). Irene Jolio Curie, having inherited the genetic code of her parents and with enormous scientific effort and dedication, received her own Nobel Prize from chemistry. Marie and Irene, women of Slavic descent, paved the way for other women in science and education, with a sheer power of their minds, in times when little attention was paid to women’s education. There are people who over-exceed the time they live in, with their abilities and ways of life. These are the personages who are capable of tremendous mental and physical efforts, able to achieve incredible results. These people possess pronounced ambition and unusual passion for creation and work. One of these rare persons, who stepped away from the mediocrity so extremely was Marie Curie, woman who left indelible mark on global science and earned her place among the greats of science. She was probably the only one who, in her ascetic dedication to science, came close to the immortal Serbian genius scientist Nikola Tesla. Figure 2. Marie (first on the left) with father Wladyslaw and sisters Zofia and Bronislawa Marie Sklodowska Curie was born in Warsaw, Poland, on November 7, 1867. Her parents were intellectuals dedicated to education. Father Wladyslaw was a professor of physics and mathematics, and mother, a pedagogue and director of a prestigious boarding school for girls. Besides Marie, who wasthe youngest, they had four more children. At the time Poland was divided between two empires, Russia and Austria. Being too much of a Pole was not advisable at the time, so her father lost his job in 1876. As it is usually the case, one misfortune pulls along the others, and Marie’s eldest sister Zofia died of typhoid fever, and almost twelve years later her Figure 1. Marie Sklodowska Curie (1867 – 1934) mother died from tuberculosis [1-3]. 1) Military Technical Institute (VTI), Ratka Resanovića 1, 11132 Belgrade, SERBIA 2) NORTAL, Lõõtsa St 6c, Тallinn 11415, ESTONIA Correspondence to: Miroslav Jandrić; e-mail: [email protected] 4 JANDRIĆ,M., DIMIĆ,D.: MARIE AND IRENE CURIE, MOTHER AND DAUGHTER, TWO LADIES, THREE NOBEL AWARDS Having finished state gymnasium, where, like her brother During her studies, she was employed as a laboratory Jozef and sister Bronislawa, she received the golden medal for technician at Lippmann Industrial Laboratory, to supplement demonstrated knowledge, Marie started supporting herself by her modest scholarship. At the suggestion of the owner of the holding private classes. Since university was not allowing laboratory, the discoverer of color photography, Gabriel women at the time in Poland, her older sister Bronislawa left Lippmann (1845-1921), Marie was doing her first scientific for Paris to study medicine. To financially aid her sister, Marie work titled "The Magnetic Properties of Hardened Steel". This found an employment as a tutor to a noble family of Żorawskis work opened the door of the School of Industrial Physics and from Krakow (1886). Here she fell in love with her employer’s Chemistry, where in 1894 she met her future spouse Pierre son Kazimierz, future prominent mathematician. Due to class Curie (1859-1906), a brilliant French physicist who was differences, his parents forbade the relationship and Marie lost already known for discovering piezoelectricity in 1880 with not only her love, but also her job [1,2,13]. his brother Jack [1-4,11]. Figure 3. Marie in Krakow – 1886 In October 1891, upon the invitation of her sister Figure 5. Marie and Pierre after their wedding – 1895 Bronislawa, who in the meantime married a colleague from the As at the beginning of his Sonnet 116, the great and studies, Marie left for Paris. She enrolled the Sorbonne unprecedented Shakespeare says: "There is no reason why University, thus attaining her longtime youthful dream. Living two great minds would not be merged into marriage," after at the first time with her sister, and then by herself, in modest, a year of acquaintance and mutual intellectual and cold and unbecoming apartments, often saving on food and emotional affection, in 1895, Marie and Pierre got married. seriously risking her health, she spent her student days in an In the same year, Pierre received his doctorate in the field absolute commitment to the studies. This self-imposed, of magnetism, in which he proved that iron-based magnetic strenuous work regime, gave results and in 1893, she materials lose their magnetic properties if heated at a graduated in physical and chemical sciences as the best and certain temperature - that temperature, that critical point, is first in her generation, and next year as the second best in now called the Curie point [3,4,13]. generation, she graduated in mathematical sciences. Figure 4. Pierre Curie (1859 – 1906) Figure 6. Marie and Pierre – 1899 JANDRIĆ,M., DIMIĆ,D.: MARIE AND IRENE CURIE, MOTHER AND DAUGHTER, TWO LADIES, THREE NOBEL AWARDS 5 Pierre introduced Marie to his mentor Becquerel in the form of isotopes with mass numbers in the range 206- (Antoine Henry Becquerel, 1852-1921) who discovered, in 232. The most common and stable is Ra-226, with a half- 1896, that uranium salts emit invisible rays that are very life of 1620 years [6-8, 10]. penetrating as well as X-rays. Encouraged by this However, many world-renowned chemists were skeptical discovery, Marie decided to study uranium rays as a part of of the existence of radium, although Marie's former professor her doctoral dissertation. Already, at the very beginning of and employer Gabriel Lippmann announced it at a lecture at her research, she proved that the radiation strength is the French Academy of Sciences (Académie des Sciences) on proportional to the amount of uranium, and that the April 12, 1898, when he informed the wider scientific radiation is not influenced by the chemical composition or community of her research work. In order to silence the the external circumstance, but that the radiation comes from skeptical part of the scientific community the Curies, thanks to the atom itself. Further research has found that such activity the advocacy of Professor Suess and the Vienna Academy of of uranium compounds is characteristic (Uraninite – oxide Sciences, received the ore from the Austro-Hungary, which of uranium – UO2) for some other substances as well originated from the Czech mine Joachimsthal, and begun to (Thorium), so she decided to call this phenomenon separate the radium. Their painstaking work gave results, and "radioactivity". Then, with Pierre's help, she discovered two in autumn 1902, after processing 8 tons of Uranium ore, they new highly radioactive chemical elements, polonium in managed to isolate 1 decigram of pure radium, of atomic July 1898, and radium in December of the same year [5] . weight 225 [6-11]. In the period from 1899 to 1904, Marie and Pierre together, individually or with one of their associates, published 32 scientific papers. In 1901, the foundations of “Curietherapy” in medicine were established, based on the discovery of the effect of radiation on the cells. It has been discovered that diseased, carcinogenic cells are much more quickly destroyed if they are exposed to radiation than a healthy cell. In order to allow their further experimental work on the treatment of cancer cells, they sought financial assistance from many. The biggest help was obtained from the US President Harding, who donated 1 gram of radium on behalf of American women. This discovery played an enormous role in further research and development of the Figure 7. Marie and Pierre in the laboratory treatment therapy of many forms of cancer. Radiological therapy is still one of the main therapeutic methods in the Polonium (Po) was named after Marie's homeland of treatment of cancerous diseases [1,2,12]. Poland. It is a rare radioactive silver-white heavy metal from VIa group of the Periodic System, with atomic number 84. It occurs in minerals containing radium, in the form of isotopes with mass numbers in the range of 192- 218. Only Po-210 can be found in nature, with a half-life of 138 days, while the most stable is Po-209 with a half-life of 102 years. Its melting point is at about 254 degrees C, and has a density of 9196 kg/m3 [6,7,9]. Figure 9. Marie and Pierre in the moments of rest On June 25, 1903, Marie Curie defended her doctoral Figure 8. Schematic view of the radium with mass number 226 dissertation entitled "Testing of Radioactive Substances", in which, among other things, she provided her understanding Radium (Ra) was named after its extremely high of the structure of radioactive radiation. Members of the radioactivity. It is a naturally occurring silvery-white commission, including Lippman (Nobel Prize winner for radioactive chemical element with atomic number 88. It physics in 1908) and Moissan (Nobel Prize winner for belongs to a group of alkaline earth metals, melts at about chemistry in 1906), were both impressed by her knowledge 700 degrees C, and has a density of 5500 kg/m3.

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