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Penetrating the Mystery
 chunk
of pitchblende may contain
up to 30 different chemical elements. The Curies were like detectives
searching for a suspected criminal in a crowded street. They had no idea
what the new element would be like, except that it was radioactive. After
long labor they succeeded in finding not one but two new elements! In
July 1898 they published a paper revealing their first discovery. They
honored Marie’s native land by naming the element “polonium.”
That December they announced the second new element, which they named
“radium” from the Latin word for ray.
Other scientists did not trust the announcement, for the Curies did not
have enough polonium and radium to see and weigh. The elements’ existence
was known from nothing but their radioactivity. The Curies would have
to separate their elements from the other substances they were mixed with.
The storeroom at Pierre’s school was too small for such work, and
the Curies continued their work in an abandoned shed nearby.
Read
what Marie wrote here.
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