Google on Saturday honoured Stefania Maracineanu on her 140th birth anniversary with a quirky Google Doodle. The tech giant wrote on the Doodle page that the woman was a pioneer in the discovery and research of radioactivity. "Today's Google Doodle celebrates the Romanian physicist's 140th birthday," the company said on the page. Who was Stefania Maracineanu? Well, she was a Romanian physicist who reportedly died because of her scientific work. Here's all you need to know about the inspirational scientist.
Stefania Maracineanu started her scientific career as a teacher in a girls' school in Bucharest. She had completed her science graduation degree in 1910. She pursued her research at the Radium Institute in Paris, which was led by world renowned physicist Marie Curie.
What was Stefania Maracineanu's scientific achievement?
Stefania Maracineanu researched about the half-life of polonium. She noticed that the half-life of polonium was dependent on the type of metal it was set on. She noticed that the radioactive material had transformed some atoms of the metal into radioactive isotopes. This was perhaps the first instance of induced radioactivity or artificial radioactivity.
In 1935, Frederic and Irene Joliot-Curie, daughter of Pierre Curie and Maria Curie, won the Nobel Prize for the discovery of artificial radioactivity. However, data showed that Stefania Maracineanu was the first to make the important discovery. She said she had discovered artificial radioactivity 10 years ago and had written about it in her thesis. She also expressed dismay at Irene Joliot Curie using her work without even mentioning it in her research paper.
She died in 1944 due to cancer, which was reportedly induced due to her exposure to radioactive material. Maria Curie had died due to radiation poisoning due to her work on radium.
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