By Marjorie C. Malley
This is often the tale of a brand new technological know-how. starting with an imprecise discovery in 1896, radioactivity led researchers on a quest for realizing that eventually faced the intersection of information and secret. Mysterious from the beginning, radioactivity attracted researchers who struggled to appreciate it. What triggered convinced atoms to offer off invisible, penetrating rays? the place did the power come from? those questions grew to become more and more urgent whilst researchers learned the method appeared to proceed indefinitely, generating large amounts of strength. Investigators came upon circumstances the place radioactivity did switch, forcing them to the startling end that radioactive our bodies have been transmuting into different elements. Chemical parts weren't immutable finally. Radioactivity produced lines of subject so minuscule and evanescent that researchers needed to devise new thoughts and tools to enquire them. Scientists in lots of international locations, yet specially in laboratories in Paris, Manchester, and Vienna unraveled the main points of radioactive differences. They created a brand new technology with really expert concepts, tools, journals, and foreign meetings. girls entered the sector in extraordinary numbers. Experiments resulted in innovative rules in regards to the atom and speculations approximately atomic power. the buzz spilled over to the general public, who anticipated marvels and miracles from radium, a scarce point came upon completely by way of its radioactivity. the hot phenomenon enkindled the mind's eye and woke up historic issues of literature and delusion. marketers created new industries, and physicians devised novel remedies for melanoma. Radioactivity gave archaeologists equipment for relationship artifacts and meteorologists a brand new cause of the air's conductivity. Their explorations printed a mysterious radiation from area. Radioactivity profoundly replaced technology, politics, and tradition. the sector produced a number of Nobel Prize winners, but radioactivity's gifted researchers couldn't resolve the mysteries underlying the recent phenomenon. That was once left to a brand new iteration and a brand new frame of mind approximately fact. no longer purely a historic account, the booklet examines philosophical matters attached with radioactivity, and relates its issues to broader concerns in regards to the nature of technological know-how. Read more... a brand new technology. The beginnings. The environment ; Rays and radiation ; Becquerel's discovery -- The Curies. Maria Skłodowska ; A consequential assembly ; New parts! -- Rutherford, Soddy, debris, and alchemy? Rutherford and the rays ; the place did the power come from? ; fabric rays? Discovery of the beta particle ; Thorium's rays ; Vanishing radioactivity ; Transmutation! ; A neglected discovery ; Reactions ; Atomic strength? ; Tragedy ; extra rays ; The alpha particle -- The radioactive Earth. The prospectors ; How previous is the earth? ; a brand new estate of topic? -- Speculations. Early theories ; Radioactivity and chance ; Kinetic versions of the atom -- Radioactivity and chemistry. the increase of radiochemistry ; Radioactive family tree ; Chemistry of the imponderable ; Inseparable radioelements ; Isotopes ; Displacement legislation ; the tip of the traces ; extra isotopes -- contained in the atom. construction blocks ; Bombarding atoms ; The nuclear atom ; The nucleus and the periodic desk ; The gamma rays ; Theories of the nucleus -- Sequel. struggle! ; Radioactivity in the course of international conflict I ; From radioactivity to nuclear and particle physics -- Measuring and utilizing Radioactivity. equipment and tools. an important offerings ; Standardizing the measures ; ideas ; measurement, funds, and machines -- Radioactivity, medication, and lifestyles. disagreeable surprises ; From burns to remedies ; Rays and different organisms ; Miracle remedy? ; Radioactive spas ; hazards within the laboratory -- New industries. Early ; hovering call for and new associations ; Paint that glowed at nighttime ; a brand new poison ; Fission, bombs, and the uranium rush ; Radioactivity and the oil -- past the tale. Radioactivity's best movers. know-how, assets, adjustments ; contributors ; examine teams ; clinical beliefs and tradition ; Mentors and types ; Age, attitudes, and ambition ; Nationalism -- Radioactivity and undying questions : the search for knowing. versions and theories for radioactivity ; styles in radioactivity's improvement ; Radioactivity and concepts approximately switch ; Radioactivity and concepts approximately subject and effort ; Radioactivity and ideas approximately continuity and discontinuity ; everlasting conundrums -- The imaginitive attraction of a discovery. Mythological and romantic dimensions of radioactivity ; An ongoing activity -- word list of rays and radiations -- relations bushes for radioactive parts -- Radioactivity's elusive reason -- Nobel Prize winners integrated during this ebook -- Radioactivity's net of effect -- Timeline
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Extra resources for Radioactivity : a history of a mysterious science
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Nobel, a wealthy Swedish industrialist and the inventor of dynamite, to honor major contributors to physics, chemistry, physiology or medicine, literature, and peace. The discovery of x rays prompted another line of research. Could these new rays have something to do with the light that cathode rays produced when they struck a screen coated with a fluorescent mineral? Perhaps other fluorescent materials gave off x rays. Th is idea must have occurred to many physicists. After attending a presentation on Röntgen rays (x rays were often called “Röntgen rays”) in January 1896 by the philosopher and mathematician Henri Poincaré, a French physicist decided to test the hypothesis that x rays were connected with fluorescence.
From Henry E. Roscoe, Spectrum Analysis (London: Macmillan, 1869), 54. There are so many ways that a sample can be compromised during the complex and delicate operations required to detect small quantities of a substance. Wary of mistaking trace impurities of a known substance for a new element, some chemists suggested that “radium”was actually barium contaminated by uranium. Or perhaps its previous exposure to uranium had made the barium radioactive, in the way that iron can be magnetized by contact with a magnet.
Physicians quickly began using the rays to visualize fractures and locate foreign bodies in their patients. Soon, they predicted, x rays would allow them to visualize internal organs and fi nd tumors. Perhaps vivisection would become obsolete. The discovery provoked dubious claims and enterprises. A farmer reported that he had used x rays to turn a common metal into gold, and a Frenchman claimed to have photographed the soul. Spiritualists hoped the rays would enhance their séances. Some in the general public feared a loss of privacy and modesty— could the rays visually disrobe a person?