1898 Extraction of Radioactive Elements by Marie Curie and Pierre Curie
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Marie Curie (1867-1934) Soon after their friend, Henri Becquerel had discovered radioactivity, Marie Curie and Pierre Curie started their long studies of radioactivity. |
The Coming of More Radioactive Elements
In 1898, they showed that thorium had similar radioactive properties. From a salt called pitchblende, they separated a new substance whose activity (i.e. [disintegration] per second) is about 400 times as great as that of uranium. They called it polonium (after Marie's homeland, Poland) . Later, they identified an even more reactive element, radium from the uranium salt.
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