Marie Curie and Einstein can be said to be famous foreign figures through the ages. The following is an introduction about them. I hope it will be useful to you
Introduction to Marie Curie
Marie Curie (1867-1934) was a French-Polish scientist who studied radioactive phenomena and discovered two radioactive elements: radium and polonium. She won the Nobel Prize twice in her life. Marie Curie (1867-1934) was a French-Polish scientist who studied radioactive phenomena and discovered two radioactive elements: radium and polonium. She won the Nobel Prize twice in her life. As an outstanding scientist, Marie Curie had a social influence that ordinary scientists did not have. Especially because she is a pioneer of successful women, her example has inspired many people. Many people heard her story as children, but mostly got a simplified and incomplete impression. What the world knows about Madame Curie. He was largely influenced by his daughter's biography "Madame Curie" published in 1937. This book beautifies the life of Marie Curie and calmly handles all the twists and turns she encountered in her life. American biographer Susan Quinn spent seven years collecting unpublished diaries and biographical information from Curie family members and friends. A new book was published last year: "Maria Curie: A Life", which paints a more detailed and in-depth image of her hard, bitter and struggling life.
Marie Curie: A great scientist who won the Nobel Prize twice
In the history of world science, Marie Curie is an eternal name. This great female scientist has made outstanding contributions in the fields of physics and chemistry with her diligence and talent, and has therefore become the only person to win the Nobel Prize twice in two different disciplines. Famous scientist.
1. Entering the University of Paris through self-study
Marie Curie was born in Warsaw, Poland in 1867. She was the youngest of five children in her family. Her father is a middle school mathematics and science teacher with very limited income, and her mother is also a middle school teacher. Mary's childhood was unfortunate. Her mother contracted a serious infectious disease, and it was her eldest sister who took care of her when she grew up. Later, her mother and eldest sister died of illness one after another when she was less than 10 years old. Her life was filled with hardships. Such a living environment not only cultivated her ability to live independently, but also helped her develop a very strong character since she was a child.
Mary has been very diligent and hard-working since she was a child. She has a strong interest and special hobby in learning. She never lets go of any learning opportunity easily and shows a tenacious and enterprising spirit everywhere. Since elementary school, she has ranked first in every subject. At the age of 15, he graduated from middle school with excellent results and a gold medal. Her father had previously studied physics at St. Petersburg University. His thirst for scientific knowledge and strong ambition also deeply inspired little Mary. She loved the various instruments in her father's laboratory very much since she was a child. When she grew up, she read many books on natural science, which filled her with fantasy. She was eager to explore the scientific world. But her family's financial situation did not allow her to go to college. At the age of 19, she began to work as a long-term tutor and also studied various subjects by herself. In this way, until the age of 24, she finally came to study at the Faculty of Science of the University of Paris. With a strong desire for knowledge, she listened to every class with concentration. The hard study made her physically worse and worse, but her academic performance was always among the best. This not only made her classmates envious, but also surprised the professors. , two years after enrolling, she took the physics bachelor's degree exam with confidence, and she ranked first among 30 candidates. The next year, she obtained a bachelor's degree in mathematics with second place honors.
At the beginning of 1894, Marie accepted a scientific research project on the magnetism of various steels proposed by the French National Council for the Promotion of Industry. In the process of completing this scientific research project, she met Pierre Curie, a teacher at the School of Physics and Chemistry, who was a very accomplished young scientist.
Therefore, both physicists and chemists, although they are interested in Marie Curie's research work, still have questions in their minds. Chemists, in particular, are more rigorous. In order to finally confirm this scientific discovery and to further study the various properties of radium, the Curies must separate more and pure radium salts from asphalt ore.
All unknown worlds are mysterious. When research efforts to isolate new elements began, they did not know any of their chemical properties. The only clue to finding the new element is that it is highly radioactive. They created a new chemical analysis method based on this. But they had no money, no real laboratories, only some simple instruments they bought or designed themselves. For the sake of work efficiency, they conducted research separately. Mr. Curie experimented to determine the properties of radium; Madame Curie continued to refine pure radium salts.
Where there is a will, there is a way! Any secret of nature will be revealed by those who tenaciously attack it. At the end of 1902, Marie Curie refined one-tenth of a gram of extremely pure radium chloride and accurately determined its atomic weight. Since then the existence of radium has been confirmed. Radium is an extremely difficult-to-obtain natural radioactive substance. It is in the form of shiny, white crystals like fine salt. In spectral analysis, it is different from the spectral lines of any known element. Although radium is not the first radioactive element discovered by humans, it is the most radioactive element. Using its powerful radioactivity, many new properties of radiation can be further identified. to enable further practical application of many elements. Medical research has found that radium rays have very different effects on various cells and tissues. Those cells that reproduce quickly are quickly destroyed by radium irradiation. This discovery made radium a powerful tool in the treatment of cancer. Cancerous tumors are composed of cells that reproduce abnormally rapidly, and laser rays can damage them far more than the surrounding healthy tissue. This new treatment method was quickly developed in countries around the world. In France, radium therapy is called Curie therapy. The discovery of radium fundamentally changed the basic principles of physics and was of great significance in promoting the development of scientific theories and their practical applications.
3. A mind like gold
Due to the amazing discovery of the Curies, they and Becquerel won the Nobel Prize in Physics in December 1903. The couple's scientific achievements are world-famous, but they extremely despise fame and fortune, and are most tired of boring social activities. They devoted everything to the cause of science without seeking any personal gain. After successfully refining radium, some people advised them to apply for patent rights from the government and monopolize the manufacturing of radium to make a fortune. Marie Curie said: "That goes against the spirit of science. Scientists' research results should be published publicly and should not be subject to any restrictions if others want to develop them." "Besides, radium is good for patients, and we should not use it to make profits." The Curies also gave away a large number of their Nobel Prizes to others.
In 1906, Mr. Curie unfortunately passed away in a car accident. Mrs. Curie suffered tremendous pain. She was determined to redouble her efforts to fulfill their common scientific ambitions. The University of Paris decided that Madame Curie would take over from Mr. Curie to teach physics courses. Marie Curie became the first female professor in the history of the famous University of Paris. When her couple isolated the first batch of radium salts, they began to study the various properties of radiation. Between 1889 and 1904 alone, they published 32 academic reports, recording their exploration of radiological science. In 1910, Marie Curie completed another book, "Monograph on Radioactivity". She also collaborated with others to successfully prepare radium metal. In 1911, Marie Curie won the Nobel Prize in Chemistry. A female scientist won the world's highest science award twice in two different scientific fields in less than 10 years. This is a unique thing in the history of world science!
In 1914, the Institute of Radium Science was established in Paris, and Marie Curie served as the institute's research director. She continued to teach at the university and was engaged in research on radioactive elements. She was generous in spreading scientific knowledge to everyone who wanted to learn.
She has been studying and working for 50 years since she was 16 years old. But she still didn't change her strict lifestyle. She has had a high degree of self-sacrifice since she was a child. In her early years, she was willing to work as a servant in other people's homes in order to support her sister's education. While studying in Paris, in order to save lamp oil and heating expenses, she studied in the library every night and did not leave until the library closed. The pitchblende required to extract pure radium was very expensive at the time. They saved bit by bit from their living expenses and bought 8 or 9 tons. After Mr. Curie passed away, Madame Curie bought thousands of tons. The radium, which was extracted with great pains and worth more than 1 million gold francs, was donated free of charge to laboratories researching and treating cancer.
In 1932, the 65-year-old Marie Curie returned to her motherland to attend the opening ceremony of the "Warsaw Radium Institute". Marie Curie has been away from her motherland since her youth and went to France to study. But she never forgot her homeland. When she was a child, her native Poland was invaded by Tsarist Russia, and she hated the invaders very much. When the couple isolated a new element from the mineral, she named it polonium. This is because the root word for polonium is the same as the name of Poland. She used this to express her deep memory for her motherland, which was enslaved by Tsarist Russia.
On July 14, 1937, Madame Curie died of illness. She eventually died of pernicious anemia. She created and developed radiation science throughout her life, and fearlessly studied highly radioactive substances for a long time, until she finally dedicated her life to this science. During her life, she won 10 prestigious prizes including the Nobel Prize, 16 medals from high-level international academic institutions, and more than 100 titles awarded by governments and scientific research institutions around the world. But she was as modest and cautious as ever. The great scientist Einstein commented: "Of all the famous people I know, Marie Curie is the only one who is not overwhelmed by fame."
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Einstein
Albert Einstein (1879-1955)
The greatest physicist of the 20th century. Einstein was born in a Jewish family in Ulm, Germany on March 14, 1879. Under the influence of his uncle, an engineer, he was enlightened in natural science and philosophy from an early age. In 1896, Einstein entered the Normal Department of the Technical University of Zurich to study physics. He obtained Swiss citizenship in 1901 and was hired by the Swiss Patent Office in Bern as a technician the following year to engage in technical appraisal of invention patent applications. He used his spare time to conduct scientific research and achieved a historic achievement in 1905. In 1909, Einstein left the Swiss Patent Office and became an associate professor of theoretical physics at the University of Zurich. In 1912, he became a professor at his alma mater, the Technical University of Zurich. In 1914, he returned to Germany and became the director of the Kaiser Wilhelm Institute of Physics and a professor at the University of Berlin. After the establishment of the fascist regime, Einstein was persecuted and forced to leave Germany. In 1933, he moved to the United States and served as a professor at the Institute for Advanced Study in Princeton until his retirement in 1945.
Einstein is one of the most creative and intelligent figures in human history. He pioneered four areas of physics during his lifetime: special relativity, general relativity, cosmology and unified field theory. He is one of the main founders of quantum theory and has also made significant contributions to molecular kinetic theory and quantum statistical theory.
Einstein published the paper "On the Electrodynamics of Moving Bodies" in 1905, proposing the principle of special relativity and the principle of constant speed of light, and established the special theory of relativity. Based on this, he further derived the mass-energy formula E=mc2, which states that mass and energy are equivalent. The special theory of relativity reveals the unity of space and time as the existence form of matter, the unity of mechanical motion and electromagnetic kinematics, further reveals the unity of matter and motion, and lays a theoretical foundation for the utilization of atomic energy.
In 1915, Einstein created the general theory of relativity, which further revealed the relationship between four-dimensional space, time and matter.
According to the gravity theory of general relativity, he inferred that light in a gravitational field does not propagate along a straight line but along a curve. In 1919, this prediction was confirmed when British astronomers observed a solar eclipse. In 1938, Einstein made significant progress in the motion problem of general relativity. He derived the object motion equation from the field equations, which further revealed the unity of space-time, matter, motion and gravity.
Einstein made great contributions to quantum theory. In 1905, he proposed the hypothesis that the distribution of energy in space is not continuous. He believed that energy at the speed of light has quantum properties in the process of propagation, absorption and generation, and successfully revealed the photoelectric effect. This is the first time in history that the unity of the wave nature and particle nature of radiation has been revealed in the process of human understanding of nature. In 1916, Einstein proposed the theory of stimulated emission in his paper on the quantum theory of radiation, which laid the theoretical foundation for today's laser technology.
After general relativity, Einstein explored the universe and the unified field theory of gravity and electromagnetism. In order to prove the stationary distribution of celestial bodies in space, a finite and boundless stationary universe model was proposed based on the gravitational field. This model is unstable. The galactic separation motion can be predicted from the gravitational field equation, and this galaxy separation motion was later observed in astronomy.
Einstein loved music and believed that his achievements in playing the violin were superior to his achievements in physics. Einstein died in Princeton on April 18, 1955. In respect of his will, no monument was built or any activities were held. His ashes were scattered in a place that will always be kept secret.