by   Jim & Rhoda Morris                      K1ugm@comcast.net      781 245 2897      http://www.scitechantiques.com/
Notice we are not spokesman for the mystery of matter project. the views express by the authors are our own private point of view.

Marie Curie was not just a star in the discovery department She was a super star. Her early work was  before the famous equation  "E=MC^2" was generated. Here is a bit of the inside story; of Her greatest discovery, her greatest message,
Her professional life, Her instruments, Her  experiments in chemistry, Her hard work,  Her keen scientific perceptiveness. Marie  was the first to discover the enormous amount of energy contained in  the atom. She found this during her researches in radioactivity. Marie made this discovery using Her finger tips plus guidance from Her radiation detector, but most important Her skill for scientific deduction from observables. Ever wonder  why  most writers - hailing Marie -  rush past this discovery not even hinting at it? It always seems just radium, radium and more radium! Could it be  a lack of drama?  A lack of public interest? We don't know.  Do you? One co-scientist did remark (summed up in one of these authors words), Leave it to some damn woman to discover and advertise the knowledge of such enormous power.  Rutherford?
 

Her discoveries of
Polonium and Radium paled by comparison. to her most important discovery-- the enormous power within the atom. Her simple observation was that her radium enriched samples were  warmer to the touch than the ones with less or no radium. How ever she recognized  that the source of this heat was many, many times that which could be generated by any chemical reaction. So before she was finished with her work with radium, Marie had ushered us into the  very dangerous, very important nuclear energy world. Not only was there the alpha, beta, and gamma rays given off by radium and its family there was - seemly- almost unlimited thermal energy being generated. That is the ---> E=MC^2 <--- relating matter to energy to the  generation of heat. 

This web site is special.  It furnishes detailed intimate pictures with comments of Marie's equipment focusing on one instrument. One that was composed of  a chain of  simple prier scientific  discoveries. Discoveries by others   blended together into her sophisticate now famous radiation detector. This detector coupled with the chemically stained  fingers of a young, beautiful, serious minded woman, led to  an  unheralded yet deeply shocking  discovery of nuclear energy and ultimately  the atom bomb.

Quiet please!  Look and listen  carefully! Can  you  hear  Marie?
 -Concentrate-. She is  sending us very important emotional messages by examples even  now on this page ?   Marie's message  maybe in  clear view but invisible to most because it is so obvious.  Obvious? But obvious is not always obvious.  Had Marie ignored the sleight difference in warmth on her chemically stained, trained,  fingers touching her samples someone else would have discovered the immense power in the atom.
Look at your fingers they're not just fingers they are scientific instruments.  fingers that can count, measure mass, radiant heat, texture,  storing information in  brail,  measure length,  sense time, via rhythm, acceleration, on and on. connect this to a  sense of logic  and  inquiry,  speaks for itself if we listen.

Yes Marie is  a popular  scientist  but for many reasons - some obvious - some not  scientific. Marie's fame carries with it  messages of considerable value some  hidden   by the drama of romance of  a young couple  in love each sharing their love of the sciences only to be separated by a tragic accident to Pierre. by the drama, of Maries as a "'female" scientist, a rounded scientist founding intuitions, doing war work for her adopted country and last not least  her scientific work.

Marie is even more extraordinary today. She still works busily in science for science. She is still a handsome intense  ageless creature which seldom if ever smiles  . Haven't you noticed and she has not changed much   ?  Marie has not been as successful in her present  role as she was with her radium. But them again  like her discovery of the energy stored in the atom is  not being heralded enough.   Her extraordinary message to the non-science public seems to be  coming across like a  lead balloon. Lead being  near the final element in the uranium radium decay chain.

The single most important messages.
 Marie whispering to the non-science world  although that is  right in front of our faces but like her fingers we do not see them or hear it. Her message maybe too close, to obvious, not interesting, exciting, nor a money maker enough to spend much  time on it.   For those  trying to help Marie get her message across they must sense the lack of emotional appeal of the message  much like Marie might have felt when she was confronted with a couple of tons of rock  and dirt called pitchblende dumped into the yard of her shed. It was  not clear that Marie sensed  that this ton of dirt only had  a tiny almost a speck of radium in it but as time pressed on Marie pressed on   spending years to get at it. 

Step one in getting at Marie's  secret message. " To be contributing a scientist one  need to be close  to insane with persistence not just brilliance " and this is generally true for most all science projects.

Another part of the - hidden not so hidden -message is the ho hum-ness of  a typical experimental scientist day. To truly understand the scientist environment the  observer  needs to get inside the scientist's brain.  But than what?. This invisible world of science is walled in by language barriers  of infinite height and length hiding the real reason scientist seldom corrupt their data. if your not one of them If one has not experienced being a scientist how can one feel the  ethical force that is  as strong in a relative sense  as the hidden forces in the atom  Neither of which are  visible to the non science world.

Because we do not hear enough of Marie's message we lose much of the truly civilized value of our scientific discoveries and its because of the wall. Would it not be wonderful if we could climb over the wall and reclaim what is rightly ours.   Another part of Marie's secret message "understanding the enormous emotional force stressing  scientist into getting it right". This is only part of the hidden message. Obvious, not Obvious! So onward Marie  keep telling  more of your story A story that helps us understand the science we don't understand that we need to understand.

The authors will try  in a very small way to help you experience what being  an experimental scientist for a day is like. maybe when your are inside of the wall you will sense the ethical force for your self.  At least you will see behind the scenes detail of scientist and film makers working together to give you a best view of dealing with a scientific topic. 

Last  but not least in the near future we will be  furnishing  the reader with a little poetry; touching, surrealistic,  quaint, tender maybe foolish love story about Marie never disclosed before.
781 245 2897     Jim & Rhoda Morris       K1ugm@comcast.net      Main web site  SciTechAntiques.com

Marie and Pierre   in their lab
figure 6

Rhoda and Jim in a part of our  lab showing the  complete replication of Marie radioactive radiation detecting setup on the  table. Note the wash bottle in Rhoda's hand.   The photo on the left. shows Marie holding her wash bottle in of her classic wash bottle pose. Figure 7

The amount of radium chloride that Marie extracted from more than a ton of pitchblende over a period of some 3 years of work. figure 8

Rhoda  replicating  one of the chemical extraction process
Marie  Curie used in her work for the separation of radioactive elements out of pitchblende. Figure 11

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Whipping up  some glowing samples to spread around the laboratory to represent the illusion of the radium fluorescing in the crystallizing dishes spread among the lab tables.Figure 12

Rhoda demonstrating before the directors possible chemical set ups for the film.  This is a scene not often pictured for the viewers. Everyone here is working hard to get the film right but often from very different perspectives. and a different "right". It is hard work but worth it. ("we're trying Marie. Rhoda is doing her best")
Figure 12a

Below a photo of Jim & Rhoda's  replication of the Curies very famous radiation detector. It's a tabletop full of high tech parts from a number of different branches of scientific research.  It is  a story within a story of how science works in a day by day basis. but there is no time to tell the instrument saga here and now. So onward.   This is the only picture showing the whole kit and computable that we know of so feast your eyes on this wonderful machine. Click the picture to get a bigger one to see all the detail.

Below we describe it piece by piece
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Figure 14 click on the photo to get a better view- It's worth it'

Radioactive radiation detectors used by Marie Curie and making one.
 First a bit of history. Radioactivity was first discovered during 1896 by the French scientist Henri Becquerel The first radiation detector was a piece of photographic film which grew darker with  exposure to radioactive materials even though the film was in a light tight container. Soon after,  It was discovered that a radioactive substance would ionize air around it allowing the air to conduct electricity. The greater the radioactivity the better the air conducted electricity. Experimenters turned this feature into a  measuring tool to rank the strength of radioactivity in various samples.

Pierre Curie
had been using a super  sensitive instrument an electrometer figures 19,20,21 for measuring voltages using very small number of electrons, He had been using such a device and  a piezoelectric voltage device in some earlier work  and recommended it to Marie so that she might use a modification of it in her studies of   radioactivity in  minerals etc..

Marie's instrument
was  essentially  a condenser used as an ionization chamber, see figure below,
(insulator));,Definition of a condenser (two electrical conductors separated by a dielectric.

 Marie's condenser consists of two metal disks separated by a layer of air . By adding electrons, Figure 19 to one plate  of this condenser  Fig. 20. it would developed a voltage difference across the two plates.

Putting a sample between the plates Exposing the air between the two plates to the radiation from a radioactive substance would caused electrons flow from  one  plate  to the other plate. equalizing the portion of electrons between the plates thus dropping the voltage drop across them to zero.

The time for this to happen would be a  function of the magnitude of the radioactivity of the  sample 

So Marie's. radiation detector turned out to be;
a condenser( a very special condenser),  a source (a very special source) of electrons, a voltmeter ( a very special voltmeter figures 19,20,21 the one with the little moving spot of light) and a stop watch to measure the time  of equalizing the electrons from one plate to the other.

Below is a fair amount of  detail in  replicating the equipment that Marie Curie used in her early  radium work for measuring the level of the radioactivity from  samples  of a wide variety of mineral etc..

The bottom line
There are four major components making up the radiation detector;  a very precise piezoelectric source of electric charge to be placed across the plates of the ionization chamber,  a quadrant electrometer  measuring the status of this charge, a stop watch, not shown, for  measuring the discharge time of  the piezoelectric crystal.

Making The components for the  metal frame of the special piezoelectric voltage generator
It was designed by Pierre and his brother  Marie used it for measuring the level of radioactivity  of her samples. The parts are just about ready to be silver  soldered. Figure 15

Cutting slots in the under top of the  wooden tripod stand for the legs that hold  the Piezoelectric power supply.Figure 16

Assembling the metal and the wooden components for the piezoelectric generator Figure 17
 

Its getting closer.
Adding the pan for carrying the weights which create  a voltage from the strain they put on the quartz crystal. thus applying   a charge across the ionization chamber. Figure 18

Our completed replica  of the infamous piezoelectric coulomb generator used in  Marie's radiation   measuring instrument. Figure 19

 The ionization chamber. Samples are placed between the horizontal circular plates and then covered to electrically shield them from stray electric voltages that would otherwise corrupt the measurements of radioactivity. Figure 20
 

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figure 21

The Quadrant electrometer is  a very special voltmeter  developed by Lord Kelvin  used by Marie this is the most sensitive and accurate of all the mechanical electrometers. The original uses a light aluminum sector suspended inside a drum cut into four segments. The segments are insulated and connected diagonally in pairs. The charged aluminum sector is attracted to one pair of segments and repelled from the other. The deflection is observed by a beam of light reflected from a small mirror attached to the sector,

In this part of the replication we remotely  controlled  by radio the location  of light and its motion on the scale in front of Marie.  This  simulated the movement of the spot of light for the actor as if there was an actual sample of radioactive material  in the ionization chamber. We chose to do this  for the safety of the filming crew and actors thus  illuminating the  need of radioactive samples on the set.

Figure 23

Spectroscope, chemicals, double spectral  spark source to record radium spectra.Figure 25

Close up view of the dual spectral light source and the split  entrance slit of the spectroscope Figure 26

Figure 27 The spectra of each atom ion or molecule is very distinct from one another. These  bar codes of  rainbows cover a range of frequencies from smaller than little and larger than big---they can only be expressed via quantum theory.  Everything we know about our universe basically come from spectroscopy and here is Marie's atomic spectrum of radium in all its beauty.

Figure28

Question Did Madam Curie shown above (in one of her more reflective moments) act as a scientist
pushing back the frontiers of science or act as an engineer working on what would be called an Atomic Bomb?
The nominal  spherical mass is crudely the size  of the  critical   mass for an  ²³⁵U nuclear weapon . It.should be  56 kg,^[3] a sphere 17.32 cm (6.8") in diameter?

Some observe that it is the little things about science that can become the most important part of science  especially in the  formation of the  nonscientist public opinion  of some piece of scientific work. This is especially true when scientist are evaluating the results of some far reaching scientific project which maybe crucially complex and crucially important to our culture.

How is one to  judge the trueness of their opinions.
1st and foremost what are the sources  of information used  forming the opinion?  
 

Why ask the question

For example, The solution to this dilemma or misunderstanding can be a simple piece of information that plays a big part in our point of judgment of the truthfulness of a scientific result . If the non scientific publics overall opinion is not sound and they don't accurately  digest  some piece of  scientific work it might result in a spectacularly noisy and warm world like 1,000,000 of these        going off spread over a ?0 years.  Using this energy in a controlled way to replace carbon as our primary source of energy might be better than using it as a non political solutions to that someone's needs.

 

How are we to  judge the trueness of a piece of scientific work, work that is extremely complex  and complex to understand. Work that  would  concern everyone every thing. Of course more often than not we use the fundamental method of trust of the people or organization used as your primary  source.

How is one to  judge the trueness of an opinion What are the sources  of information used  forming the opinion?  Why ask the question

How is one to  judge the trueness of an opinion What are the sources  of information used  forming the opinion?  Why ask the question

One of the little but important things in judging the trueness of a piece of scientific work, work that is extremely complex  to understand. is sort of  diagnostic tool we use in other circumstances of our daily life. the question  can we emotionally trust the source of the info and why the person or organization's. So it is important to know what is the working environment of the source not so much the person or organization.

 a typical scientist and the  fellow scientist working on the same project, What kind of rules and environment do scientist  live in and by?  the incidental day by day  monotony of the work. It seems trivial doesn't it. Remember Marie in her work.  Think of it,  only  a few humans out of the multitude of all the bright  people in the world can take and live with the monotony being a scientist. It  is  not just being  resourceful and creative that makes a scientist, it is having the determination, the willingness in spite of the boredom and frustration to get  your project right. 
The average day in a scientist project is so boring to the average person that the story tellers; the historians, ,The media  can only hold our interest  by working really  hard at building the few  short moments of glorious feeling to a super height to keep the viewers //  readers attention. Of course this process tends to distort the view  of how scientist work so much so that to the average person  pauses,  wonders whether the scientist  had the patients or common sense to get it right. Few of the nonscientific public  emotionally  feel that the results of a project  is just plain hard ass work. The tedious work of getting  repeatability of the measured data and  getting the same answer by other ways as well.  Of course in time the scientist  answer will be measured more accurately by the next generation. on and on Just like light Marie's little spot of light has been made brighter and righter with time.

The authors wonder if we would be worth concentrating  little more on checking our sources of info that we use to form our opinions. Especially when some of the work is so important to our civilization. that  instead of living in a confusion  and profusion by technical knowledge to get to gain a scientific trueness  instead could it be better to develop an  emotional awareness of how hard it is to survive  as scientific scientist and to have your work accepted by your colleagues. In their world scientist depend enormously on the other scientist work to do theirs . if the other guy is wrong than all of your hard won work goes down the drain.  could this fact be  strong enough to validate their results most of the time for the average folk that have  more important things to do than take science courses, courses  that might lower your grade average which might prevent you from taking further degrees and or getting a better job. There has to be a better way?

In the near future we will be  furnishing  the reader with a little poetry; a touching, surrealistic, quaint,  tender, maybe a little foolish love story about Marie never disclosed before.
and is o be announced shortly on this web site

WORK IN PROGRESSThis has to be one of the most well known photos of a scientist who was all ready well known. with hunders maybe thousands of photos take of him and avaiable to the public before this likeness showed up  so what is he saying after livimng so  many years having done so much through  science tha effected each and everyone of us. what is this last message  that is reaching out to each and everyone that can  all cultures both sexes all ages..seen whT IAS HUIS LAST WORD TO US

Question what is he telling the viewer . As I 've studied it over and over again. Their is one messaage he maybe be convaying to the viewer is that he is telling the view in body language  what he thinks of you personally Dr.Einstie

Jim & Rhoda doing the bottom paint on their sailboat.

 Rhoda the skipper of Josh with a rain storm in the offing.