Madam Curie Essay, Research Paper

Madam Curie

Manya Sklodowska, as she was called before marriage, was born in Warsaw, Poland, in 1867. Her father taught mathematics and physics. Her mother, a musician who played the piano and sang, was never able to hug or kiss her children because of Tuberculosis, a very contagious disease, which later took her life on May 7, 1878. Manya had 2 sisters Bronya and Zosia. They both caught Typhus at a young age which took Zosia s life and made Bronya s life stronger.

Years later Bronya wanted to become a doctor, but Manya s father had lost allot of their money in a bad investment. But when Manya heard this she said she would work while Bronya went to school. The only descent jobs that were around for women was to become a governess, so she became a governess. The first job that she had was with a family of lawyers . She couldn t stand being with that family because they were mean and unjust and she was used to warm and friendly so she quit and was offered another job with a family, The Zoraskis, out in the country. The only problem with this was that she would have to leave home and move in with the Zoraskis. She accepted the job and left home and worked with the family for three years.

Until there son, Casmir, returned home from college. The young couple instantly fell in love and in a short period the couple started talking about marriage, but Casmir was afraid of his parents so when he asked his parents for permission to marry Manya his parents said with her she is a nobody, she has no money, and instead of marring her anyway he acted like coward and said he wasn t going to marry her. Manya was torn up on the inside, but she was able to finish working with the family until her contract was finished.

By this time her sister finished school and had got married to Casimir Dluski, who had graduated 1 year before Bronya, and were living on their own. This meant that Manya could go to school and live with Bronya and her husband. But when she arrived she wanted to start over, so she changed her name to Marie because it s French and she had always loved it. Marie had to move out because she needed to study and Bronya and Casmir loved to party and through parties, so Marie moved out. She moved into a quite cheap apartment that she had to pay for by herself. It was time for Marie to take her examinations for her masters degree in physics. She passed the test highest of everyone in her class. That wasn t enough though she wanted her masters degree in Mathematics. This time she didn t have to pay for school because she got the Alexandrovitch Scholarship which paid for all of her school.(Years later Marie saved up 600 rubels and paid back her scholarship. No one had ever paid back the Alexandrovitch foundation.)

While studying for her masters degree in mathematics the Society for the Encouragement of National Industry asked her to prepare a study of the magnetic properties of various steels. But she didn t have enough room in her apartment. So she asked a few professors and they new a scientist, Pierre Curie, who had an extra laboratory agreed to let her work there. Marie and Pierre liked each other at once because they both loved science so much. They fell in love and married 1 year later. Two years after they were married they had a baby girl named Irene.

Marie wanted more she wanted her doctrines degree in physics, But she needed a subject for her thesis. So she thought and read and listened to other physicists. And at last a French scientist had discovered uranium gave out rays, even in absolute darkness. It was as if uranium contained some sort of energy. But where did the energy come from? That question became the subject of Marie s thesis. Over 2 years of researching Marie and with a little help from Pierre they discovered radium and polonium, the answer was in the core of the atom it contained a new energy called radioactivity. Now they had to compute the atomic weight of the new elements. To obtain the atomic weight they would need pure elements. So they asked the Austrian government for 1 ton of pitchblende and the government agreed. It took 4 years to obtain pure radium. It was official radium was a new elements . Radium helped treat diseases, cancers, scares, and many other things. She was awarded the Nobel Prize in 1903.Marie had another baby girl named Eve in 1904. On Thursday, April 19, 1906 Pierre was killed by horse drawn wagon on accident. In December of 1911 she was awarded the Nobel prize again for isolating the radium as a metal instead of a salt. She was the only person to have received the Nobel Prize twice. On July 4, 1934 Marie Currie died of leukemia(or over exposure to radioactive material).But because of her, and the discovery of radium it gave-and still gives- life to countless people.