In the Footsteps of Marie Curie

The Polish-born French physicist and chemist twice won the Nobel Prize for her pioneering research in the field of radioactivity.

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Marie Curie knew her hours were numbered. “Was it done with radium or with mesothorium?” she asked her daughter as she lay in her deathbed at a sanatorium in the French Alps in July 1934. For years, during her experimentation with radioactivity, she had inadvertently exposed herself to lethal levels of radiation, meaning that, by the time she had reached the age of 66, nothing could save her. But her perilous work proved invaluable to science. She discovered the elements radium and polonium, and she transformed our understanding of radioactivity. Without Marie Curie, we would never have developed radiotherapy as a medical treatment. The Polish-born Frenchwoman, who carried out her most important work while living in Paris, won the Nobel Prize in both physics and chemistry – the only woman to win the award in two fields.

Earlier this year, though, Mme Curie, arguably the best-known of all female scientists, was at the centre of a heritage row in Paris. The Pavillon des Sources, one of three buildings in the Latin Quarter that comprised Curie’s Paris laboratory, was under threat from the French Ministry of Culture, which wanted to dismantle it brick by brick, decontaminate it of radiation and reconstruct it on a new site nearby. After much campaigning, however, including appeals to Emmanuel Macron himself, the building was given a last-minute reprieve and will now form part of a new cancer research centre called Marie Curie – Claudius Regaud. Under the new plans, the Pavillon des Sources will become a cultural space for an existing museum dedicated to the famous scientist – the Musée Curie, just a stone’s throw away – and will eventually be open to the public. Although extensive decontamination will have to take place first, if the redevelopment does go ahead, it will provide a fitting tribute to one of the sharpest female minds in the history of science.

Born Maria Sklodowska in Warsaw, on November 7, 1867, even as a child, Marie Curie demonstrated great intelligence. Then, with little money in the family, she took a post as a governess before moving to Paris in 1891 to study at the Sorbonne, where her results were outstanding. Fellow students remembered her working hard late into the night in her digs, surviving on little more than tea, bread and butter.

In 1894, Marie met Pierre Curie, and married him the following year. It was the start of a romantic and academic partnership that would result in the discovery of the elements radium and polonium (the latter named after her native Poland). In 1903, Marie, Pierre and a third scientist called Henri Becquerel were jointly awarded the Nobel Prize for physics thanks to their discovery of radioactivity. Marie was appointed lecturer in physics at the École Normale Supérieure for girls in Sèvres, in the southwestern suburbs of Paris, introducing a novel style of teaching based on scientific experiments. But tragedy struck in 1906 when Pierre was fatally run over by a horse-drawn cart. Devastated, Marie nonetheless soldiered on with her work, determined to complete the research she and her husband had embarked on together. Appointed to the professorship role left vacant by Pierre’s death, she became the first woman to teach at the Sorbonne. A few years later she was awarded her Nobel Prize in chemistry for the isolation of pure radium.

War effort

During the First World War, Marie was keen to contribute to France’s war effort. First she purchased war bonds and then she offered the government the gold medals from her two Nobel prizes – an altruistic gesture which was turned down. Instead she decided to serve the French army by converting motor vehicles into mobile X-ray units, known as ‘petites Curies’, which she and colleagues drove to field hospitals where they X-rayed wounded soldiers.

After the war, Marie concentrated on developing medical applications for radioactivity. It was this work that so tragically contributed to her own undoing. Unaware of the extreme dangers of radiation, she inadvertently exposed herself to huge amounts over the course of her life. She had none of the health and safety regulations that modern scientists benefit from. According to some reports, she used to keep test tubes of radioactive isotopes in her pockets and her desk drawers, noting the faint light that they gave off in the dark. She was also exposed to multiple X-rays while working as a radiologist in the wartime field hospitals.

Marie died in July 1934, at the Sancellemoz Sanatorium in Passy, in Haute-Savoie. She was buried in Sceaux, just south of Paris, alongside her beloved Pierre. Sixty years later, in 1995, in tribute to their achievements, the remains of both scientists were transferred to the Panthéon in Paris, alongside France’s other heroes. Marie is the first woman to be buried there on the strength of her own achievements.

Coincidentally, the Panthéon is just a couple of streets away from the other site that anyone interested in this remarkable woman ought to visit – the Musée Curie, on Rue Pierre et Marie Curie. Free to visit, it celebrates the different stages of Marie’s life work. Here, the office in which she worked for more than 20 years has been preserved just as it was almost a century ago. “As if the boss had never left,” say the curators. The original wooden desk is there, atop it a green desk lamp and black telephone. Behind it is the large glass and wooden bookcase in which Marie kept her research materials. A photo of Pierre is next to the window overlooking the garden.

In the laboratory

Adjacent to the office is Marie’s laboratory, where she worked for many years isolating radioactive elements. It was decontaminated and restored in the early 1980s and now contains a few instruments and glass containers that Marie originally used for experiments. Behind the museum is the garden that Marie herself created in 1912. “It’s an English-style garden,” say the curators, “soft, hazy, wild and rustic. It’s always green and alive, whatever the season.” In the garden there’s also an exhibition of outdoor portraits of the scientist, her family and her colleagues, as well as a statue of Marie and Pierre. It’s a poignant testimonial to a truly great scientist.

The museum is open 1pm-5pm on Wednesdays to Saturdays.

musee.curie.fr

From France Today Magazine