Marie Curie and the discovery of radium #shorts

On the 20th April 1902, Marie and Pierre Curie proved the existence of the new element radium when they chemically isolated one-tenth of a gram of pure radium chloride.

Inspired by the work of the French physicist Henri Becquerel who had been the first person to discover radioactivity, the Curies’ work won them the 1903 Nobel Prize in Physics which they shared with Becquerel himself.

Following Marie's discovery that the element thorium was radioactive, Pierre dropped his own research in 1898 to work with her. Having announced the existence of the elements polonium and radium, they set about proving their existence by isolating them from the mineral pitchblende.

After processing tons of the mineral, they eventually obtained one-tenth of a gram of radium chloride on 20 April 1902, for which they shared the 1903 Nobel Prize in Physics.

#shorts