Marie Curie

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and that there exists a
critical temperature above which the magnetic properties disappear, this is
called the Curie temperature.

Marie Curie was interested in the recent discoveries of radiation, which
were made by Wilhelm Roentgen on the discovery of X-rays in 1895, and by Henri
Becquerel in 1896, when he discovered uranium gives off similar invisible
radiation as the X-rays. Curie thus began studying uranium radiation and made
it her doctoral thesis. With the aid of an electrometer built by Pierre, Marie
measured the strength of the radiation emitted form uranium compounds and found
it proportional to the uranium content, constant over a long period of time and
influenced by external conditions. She detected a similar immutable radiation
in the compounds of thorium. While checking these results, she made the
discovery that uranium pitchblende and the mineral chalcolite emitted four times
as much radiation as their uranium content. She realized that unknown elements,
even ...

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