Madame curie
Many textbooks use the story of "Marie Curie" who struggled for half a lifetime to discover the "radium" as inspirational teaching materials, but it rarely reveals how the life of this "inspirational" idol has suffered injustice, discrimination and attacks.
Graduated from a prestigious French institution with the first place, but did not have the opportunity to apply for a most common position. With first-class efforts, he has made outstanding contributions that are enough to benefit future generations, and has won the Nobel Prize twice, but he has not had the opportunity to enter the French Academy of Sciences and is not qualified to read his papers at the Academy of Sciences. Even her lab was in her husband's name, and after his death she had to apply multiple times to regain her research qualifications.
In 1903, Marie Curie won the Nobel Prize in Chemistry for the first time– a common knowledge that most people know, but few people know, and in the nomination letter jointly submitted by 4 famous scientists of the time, Marie Curie's name was not even mentioned. The main credit goes to an aristocratic scientist from a family of chemistry named Becquerel, and Pierre Curie's role is vaguely described in the description as Becquerel's "assistant" to him. Had it not been for Curie's insistence and the immense power of the fact that it existed, this Becquerel would not have allowed Marie Curie, a woman's name, to be listed with him.
The fact is that Marie Curie independently completed the purification of radium and the exploration and conclusion of radioactive materials, Pierre Curie is more of her partner and assistant, the concept and theory of radioactive existence, the earliest was born in Marie Curie's great mind. Becquerel had no substantive guidance or help for this work at all, but relied on his status and status as an introducer for the Curies and brought them into the door of the scientific community, which was still controlled by high society at that time. And this Becquerel actually had the face to say in his speech: "Marie Curie's contribution is to serve as a good assistant to Pierre Curie, which gives us reason to believe that God has chosen women to be the best assistants to cooperate with men." ”
Fortunately, history has not been blinded. Marie Curie possessed not only the genius of physics and chemistry, but also the stoic will necessary for a genius to shine. 32 years later, she won the Nobel Prize for the second time for purifying the metals radium and polonium – this time, she was the only one on the list. In her speech, she succinctly clarified the injustice of the world to her in the first award: "The research on radium and radioactivity was done by me alone. It is also true that during the long 4 years of her first radium purification, Pierre Curie had been busy with his other subjects for more than two years, and it was not until the third year that he intervened in her research and helped her improve some measuring instruments, which had always been his strong point.
Marie Curie was a strong and great feminist all her life. She once calmly said to her daughter: "In a world where men make the rules, they think that a woman's function is sex and procreation. Her daughter, Erin, later became the second woman in the world to win the Nobel Prize in Chemistry.
What made future generations sigh the most was Marie Curie's love. After the death of her husband, Marie Curie's life fell into an ice state until Paul Lang zhiwan intervened in her life. Lang Zhiwan was also a rather remarkable scientist, five years younger than her, and could well have become her new assistant, lover, companion and comrade-in-arms, and the second youth of this woman's life had thus befallen, even if it was so short, enough to give her an unprecedented amount of energy. Lang Zhiwan's own marriage was also extremely problematic, and he married the daughter of a ceramic worker. She was grumpy and rude, breaking her husband's head with a vase during an argument, and she despised his research work because it brought no cash.
Lang Zhiwan was in love with Marie Curie. Of course, his divorce failed. At the same time, he foolishly let his wife get marie Curie's love letters to him, which were eventually published to the newspaper.
At the age of 45, Marie Curie fell into the trough of discredit. The so-called romantic, free-spirited Frenchmen pounced like jackals on their great benefactors. (The X-ray machine made and operated by Marie Curie saved millions of wounded French soldiers on the battlefields of World War I, and she and her daughter eventually died of blood disease from excessive X-rays and other radioactive exposures) They attacked her home, stoned her windows, claiming to kill her and get her out of France. And some French scientists who had enthusiastically supported her and were scientifically with her also wrote a joint letter asking her to leave France. Her most loyal comrade-in-arms, Paul Epe, also betrayed her and agreed to leave France.
There is no reason for it, because in her correspondence with her lover, she actually shows that she has a strong sexual need and tries to satisfy it. And the rule of the world is that women should not have this need at all, and even if they do, they should try to suppress and wear it down, rather than justifiably claiming to want to satisfy it through love. So she was nailed to such a term: Polish slut.
Paul Eppe's daughter, one of Marie Curie's most devoted students and supporters, came into a great conflict with her father, standing before her father and saying word for word: "If you dare to drive her away, I will never see you again, my father." She had never confronted her father in her life, but she was furious at this one thing. She made it clear that the following words were left for her father and for the future: "If Marie Curie were a man, none of this would have happened."
It is well known that Einstein, another great scientist of his generation, not only divorced and remarried, but also had an illegitimate daughter. He sent her straight away. Paul Lang Zhiwan, who is also the protagonist of this extramarital affair, was not affected. His wicked wife, after successfully inciting public opinion to destroy Marie Curie, agreed that he would openly have another female secretary as a lover, thus saving the marriage, and even many years later, she agreed that her husband was involved with a young schoolgirl. In order to support the female student's lover, Lang Zhiwan even asked Marie Curie to arrange a position for the student at the institute.
Marie Curie with her husband
Marie Curie, in this storm of public opinion, walked towards the fall of her life. For nearly three years, her spirit was in a state of collapse, overwhelmed by the hostility around her, and had to be admitted to a nun-run hospital for both physical and mental treatment.
Simply put, without her, there would be no current radiation therapy for cancer. Simply put, it was she who enlightened human exploration of atomic properties, and on the basis of her path of studying radioactivity and the properties of atoms, other scientists eventually discovered the internal structure of atoms.
If humanity had a point of demarcation for the atomic age, it should begin with the discovery of radioactivity. It started with her, Marie Curie.
(Excerpt from the biography of Marie Curie)