Bulletin of the American Physical Society
APS March Meeting 2017
Volume 62, Number 4
Monday–Friday, March 13–17, 2017; New Orleans, Louisiana
Session V40: Marie Curie - A 150th Birthday CelebrationInvited Undergraduate
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Sponsoring Units: FPS CSWP Room: 387 |
Thursday, March 16, 2017 2:30PM - 3:06PM |
V40.00001: Marie Curie: the Curie Institute in Senegal to Nuclear Physics Invited Speaker: Paul Gueye Sub-Saharan Africa is not a place where one will look first when radioactivity or nuclear physics is mentioned. Conducting forefront research at the international stage at US national facilities such as the Thomas Jefferson National Accelerator Facility in Virginia or the National Superconducting Cyclotron Facility/Facility for Rare Isotope Beams in Michigan does not point to Historically Black Colleges either. The two are actually intrinsically connected as my personal journey from my early exposure to radiation at the Curie Institute at the LeDantec Hospital in Senegal lead me to Hampton University. The former, through one of my uncles, catapulted me into a nuclear physics PhD while the latter houses the only nuclear physics program at an HBCU to date that has established itself as one of the premier programs in the nation. This talk will review the impact of Marie Curie in my life as a nuclear physicist. [Preview Abstract] |
Thursday, March 16, 2017 3:06PM - 3:42PM |
V40.00002: Marie Curie and Mildred Dresselhaus, inspirations to women in science Invited Speaker: Cherry Murray The physics community lost the celebrated physicist Mildred Dresselhaus on February 20, 2017. Millie was originally scheduled to give this talk describing how fascination with Marie Curie’s biography propelled her into science at a young age. I will talk about the many parallels I see between the two pioneers: Marie Curie, born in 1867, who was an inspiration to a young Millie, and Millie, born in 1930, who was an inspiration to me, as well as many more women and men in science. I will also describe some of Millie’s research in condensed matter physics making use of radioactivity and the heritage of Marie Curie. [Preview Abstract] |
Thursday, March 16, 2017 3:42PM - 4:18PM |
V40.00003: Marie Curie: Physicist and Woman Invited Speaker: Ruth Howes Marie Sklodowska was born in Warsaw on November 7, 1867. Girls were not allowed to attend college in Poland, so Marie found a well-paying post as a governess in rural village which she held for three years while helping her older sister complete medical school in Paris. Then Marie moved to Paris and graduated first in her class at the Sorbonne with a master's degree in physics in 1893. In 1895, she married the talented young physicist, Pierre Curie. Marie decided to investigate the radioactive components of the mineral pitchblende for her dissertation. The work involved chemical analysis of a ton of material in an unheated shed. Pierre joined her and at the end of 1898, the Curies announced the discovery of radium and polonium. Through 1899, Marie labored to measure the atomic weight of radium. In 1903, Marie earned her doctorate, the first for a woman in France, and the Curies split the Nobel Prize in Physics with Henri Becquerel. They became widely known, besieged by the press and frequently invited to make presentations and be awarded honors. They hated fame and both suffered bad health. In April, 1906, Pierre Curie was struck by a wagon and killed instantly. Marie was left as a single mother with two young daughters. Fortunately, the Sorbonne hired her to fill Pierre's position. In 1911, she was rejected for membership in the French Academy of Science because she was a woman. Also in 1911, she was accused of having an affair with a married French physicist Paul Langevin. The resulting scandal hit the press and brought angry mobs to her home. In the middle of this hullaballoo, she was informed that she had won a second Nobel Prize, this time in Chemistry. When World War I broke out, Marie mounted x-ray units on cars and became a heroine. She visited the United States in 1921 where President Harding presented her with a gram of radium. She continued her scientific studies in spite of declining health until her death in 1934. [Preview Abstract] |
Thursday, March 16, 2017 4:18PM - 4:54PM |
V40.00004: The growth of nuclear daughters Invited Speaker: Sherry Yennello Often people think of radioactivity as the disappearance of a nucleus through decay, but equally true is the appearance of a new nucleus – the daughter. The birth of daughters enables the transformation of a field from being very male dominated to having more diverse representation. In the same way that a relatively pure sample of Uranium develops over time to have many different components, the relatively homogeneous field of physics that Marie lived in has transformed in the last 150 years to have much greater representation. This talk will discuss the current status of women in physics and efforts to continue to diversify the field. We have come a long way and I’m sure Marie is smiling down upon us. [Preview Abstract] |
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