THE MUSEOLOGIST 



This little magazine is devoted to the inter n(d affairs of the Museum. It 

 exists for the sake of all the Museum ivorkers, and offers itself as a ready 

 medium through ichich they may cone into closer touch with each otfier and 

 with the Corporation. 



It is issued by the Publicity Committee. 



Volume 2 ^^^y, 1921 Xumber 5 



Madame Curie and Radio-activity 



Vs V are acciistouuHl to associate X\\v pheiiomeiia of tlie 

 natural sciences one with another, in a i)iogressive seii(^s IVoni 

 the known to the luiknown. The phenomenon of ratho- 

 activity is a striking- exception to this lono- esta])hshe(l maich 

 of scientific knowledge. AMth the discovery of rachum we are 

 confronted with a distinctly new perspecti^'e of knowledge 

 regardinji the constitution of matter, — a side-light unrelated 

 to either chemistry or j^h^'sics. Thus it nia}^ be said that 

 [Madame Curie and her co-workers have broken entirely 

 new ground in science. They have as it were invented a 

 new science — that of Radio-activity. And yet this new 

 science, far from destroying or replacing the established 

 facts of chemistry and ph3'sics, has in fact correlated and ex- 

 panded them. 



The history of the researches in radio-activity is a rela- 

 tively recent one. From the discover}^ of the X-rays by 

 Rontgen in 1895 and the first experiments of Henri Becquerel 

 in 1896 down to our own day is a matter of only a decade and 

 a half. In this period, which will undoubtedly be called in 

 the years to come the period of the birth of the new science, 

 no name stands out with greater significance than that of 



