This year marks the anniversary of the discovery of radioactive element radium by the Curies.

100 years ago, 1898, 12.26, French Academy of Sciences were all people. A solemn and slightly tired young beauty stepped onto the platform, and the audience was suddenly silent. Her name was Marie Curie, and she became famous all over the world. Today, she and her husband pierre curie will announce an amazing discovery here. They discovered the natural radioactive element radium. Originally, she wanted her husband to give a report, but pierre curie insisted on it. Because before that, no woman had been on the podium of the French Academy of Sciences. Marie Curie is wearing a long black dress, and her white and dignified face shows a firm and slightly indifferent expression, while her slightly sunken big eyes make you feel that you can see through everything and the future. Her report shocked the audience, physics entered a new era, and her beautiful and solemn image was fixed in history and everyone's heart.

Madame Curie has always been one of the few celebrities I admire. When it comes to female celebrities, she is the first, and then there will probably be a China Li Qingzhao. I read a pamphlet about Madame Curie when I was in middle school. From then on, her determined image will never be erased from my mind. I searched almost all her biographies after that. A person's greatness is nothing more than two aspects, one is his contribution to society, the other is his personality and his spirit. For Madame Curie, she has both aspects. She is incomparable and deserves our eternal memory and study.

Madame Curie was not the first person to discover radioactivity, but she was a key figure. Before her, 1896 65438+ 10, German scientist Roentgen discovered X-rays, which are artificial radioactivity; 1896 in may, French scientist becquerel discovered that uranium salt can make film sensitive, which is natural radioactivity. This is still an accidental discovery, but Madame Curie immediately raised a new question. Are other substances radioactive? Is there another brand-new field in the material world? Others found shells on the beach, but she wanted to study how shells were born, how long they were and how they washed up on the beach. Others grope for vines, others pick leaves, and she wants roots. She coined the word radioactivity. Two years later, she discovered polonium, then radium, and the tip of the iceberg was exposed. In order to put forward pure radium, the Curies got a ton of industrial waste residue which may contain radium. They set up a big pot in the yard and smelled it bite by bite. And then sent to the laboratory for dissolution, precipitation and analysis. The so-called laboratory is an abandoned shed where autopsy bodies were once parked. Mary stirred the slag in the pot in a smoky fire all day. She has acid and alkali burns on her clothes and hands. One day, Mary, who was very tired, rubbed her sore lower back and asked Pierre across a table full of test tubes and measuring cups, "What do you think this radium will look like?" Pierre said, "I just hope it has beautiful colors." Finally, after three years and nine months, they extracted 0. 1g radium from several tons of slag. It really has a very beautiful color, and it emits a slight blue fluorescence in the dark broken wooden shed. It will also release heat automatically, and the heat released in one hour will melt the same weight of ice.

This beautiful pale blue fluorescence in the old wooden shed was bought with the life and belief of a beautiful woman. It seems that this great discovery that opens a new era of science should not fall on a woman. For thousands of years, beauty has always been a woman's highest honor and biggest capital. As long as you are lucky enough to get this, don't ask the rest. Mo Bosang said in his masterpiece "The Necklace": "Women have no social class and no racial differences; Their beauty, elegance and charm are the symbols of their life experience and family. " Madame Curie belongs to that kind of beauty. Her portrait is now hung in scientific research and teaching institutions all over the world, and we can still see her once elegant demeanor. But she just didn't use this capital, and it was from this point that she conquered herself. When she was a primary school student, she showed God's love for her, and her beautiful appearance was enough to please everyone around her. But there is something more precious in her character, that is, the backbone that people often add to men. She is firm and courageous, with lofty and persistent pursuit. In order not to be disturbed by beauty, she deliberately cut her blonde hair very short. She said to her brother, "There is no doubt that everyone in our family has talent, and this talent must be shown by one of us!" " She knows not only personal self-esteem, but also national self-esteem. At that time, Poland was ruled by the czar. On her way to school every day, there is a statue of the czar's lackeys. Mary always takes a bite when she passes by. If she forgets to talk to her date that day, she will come back to make up for it even if she walks to the school gate. After graduating from high school, she worked as a governess in the city and the countryside for seven years, saved a little tuition and came to Paris to study. At that time, there were few female students in universities. This beautiful exotic woman with high forehead, blue eyes and slender figure quickly became the center of discussion. In order to see her more or get together to say a few words, male students often crowded in the corridor outside the classroom. Her girlfriend even tried to drive away these admirers with an umbrella handle. But she dismissed the excitement. She arrives first every day and sits in the front row, giving those who look for it a heartless back of the head. She is always wrapped in a layer of frosty armor, which makes those "groupies" afraid to approach. She used to live at her sister's house. In order to be quiet, she rented a small attic, ate only one meal a day and studied hard day and night. It was too cold to sleep at night, so I pulled a chair on my body to get a little warmth. This kind of distracted and enterprising spirit is difficult for ordinary men to ration food in one day. On the other side of the world in France, a Polish woman is so calm, so persistent, so able to endure the biting cold. At the tender age of 25, she is indifferent to the tide of suitors. As long as she releases her hand a little and turns her head back, she will fall back into the soft embrace and the bubble of praise. But she is ambitious, ambitious. She knows that only by discovering the flower of creation will there be eternal beauty. So she is willing to let acid and alkali gnaw at her soft hands and let the choking smoke wrinkle her beautiful forehead.

Marie Curie could have lived in another way. She can live a relaxed and happy life in admiration and praise, while being young and beautiful, just like a modern girl eating a youthful meal. But she didn't. She knows her deeper value and farther goal. The "little taste" of a language refers to people's understanding of the outside world, but I don't know how many people often know little about themselves and are happy to see pets. You see how many girls in Wang Po "admire" melons, feeling sorry for themselves and not knowing the way forward. A few years ago, a mother told me that her daughter's grades had dropped. Why? Answer: "I know I love beauty, and I always use a pencil rod as her curling iron in class." Beauty is an addition to man, just as meter is an addition to poetry. It is difficult to write a poem, but it is difficult for a beautiful woman. Doing it well is earth-shattering. If it is not done well, it is a waste of time. Marie Curie created the whole world.

Women all know that besides "life experience" and "family background", they have more valuable and important things.

1852, Mrs Smith wrote Uncle Tom's Cabin, which led to the outbreak of the American Civil War. Lincoln said that it was a little woman who triggered a great revolution to liberate slaves. About 50 years later than the tavern lady, Madame Curie discovered that radium was also a little woman, which triggered a great revolution and a scientific revolution. It directly led to Lu Se's exploration of atomic structure, the explosion of the atomic bomb and the coming of the atomic age. More importantly, the philosophical significance of this discovery. Philosophers say things are always changing. Western philosophers say that one cannot step into the same river twice. In A.D. 1082, Su Dongpo, an oriental philosopher, sighed at the moon in Chibi: "Gai must look at it from its own changes, then heaven and earth cannot flash; From its constant point of view, things are infinite. " Now, Madame Curie has proved that radium is such an "impossible-to-exist" substance that it constantly emits light, heat and radiation. It can burn people's skin, penetrate black paper to make film sensitive, and make air conductive. I am myself in an instant, but not myself. Philosophy permeates the pores of every atom. Marie Curie almost completed this great natural discovery and discovered the meaning of life. She is also constantly changing. When the work is fruitful, the laser line is silently eroding her body. Her beautiful and healthy face is fading away, and she gradually becomes dizzy and tinnitus, and her face is pale and weak. Pierre unfortunately died young, and social discrimination against women increased her heavy burden in life and thought. But she doesn't care about anything, just works silently. She changed from a beautiful little girl, a dignified and determined female scholar, to a new term "radiation" in science textbooks, to a new unit of measurement in physics, to a series of scientific theorems, and she became an eternal milestone in the history of science. "Never change the middle view" will be eternal. "I hate that spring is nowhere to be found. I don't know how to become it." Just like chemical substitution reaction, her youthful beauty has been transferred into science textbooks and human cultural history.

Madame Curie's fame spread all over the world from the moment she discovered radium, and it has been one hundred years since then. This is the honor she bought with all her youth, faith and life. She won 10 awards, 16 medals and 107 honorary titles, especially two Nobel Prizes. She can enjoy any reward or honor. But she treats fame and fortune like dirt. She gave the prizes for scientific research and war to France, and gave those medals as toys to her 6-year-old daughter. She is not tired of the beauty given by God, how can she bear the reputation given by the world? On the basis of who is short and who is long, I changed the floating name to jingyan. She worked hard as always until she died at the age of 67 and left her beloved laboratory. Until 40 years after her death, there were still rays in her used notebook. Einstein said: "among all the world celebrities, Marie Curie is the only one who has not been spoiled by fame." She strives for the world with things, is detached and free from vulgarity, knows her goals and her own value. It is difficult for ordinary people to know these two points, eliminate interference and remain unchanged for life, but Madame Curie did. She made us understand that people have multiple values and need multi-layer development. Some people stop at the form and sell their appearance; Some people stop at courage and show their strength; Some people stop at their hearts and only use skills; Some people seek reason and use their wisdom. Zhuge Liang fought all his life and swallowed Cao Wu, but he didn't wear armor or a blade. Mao Zedong commanded the army and the people and created a new China in the war, but he didn't carry a gun and was not restricted by his rank. Great voices are heard, the road is invisible, and people with great wisdom are not obsessed with shape, strength and technique. They live calmly, think quietly, make persistent progress, go straight to the highland of wisdom, control the law freely, and always maintain a rational beauty.

Madame Curie is such a great man standing on the highland of wisdom.

Brief introduction of the author

Liang Heng Liang Heng is from Huozhou, Shanxi. Born in 1946, graduated from China Renmin university 1968. He has been a reporter of Inner Mongolia Daily and Guangming Daily, and deputy director of the State Press and Publication Administration. Currently, he is deputy editor-in-chief of People's Daily, doctoral supervisor of School of Journalism, Renmin University of China, member of the National Committee of Chinese Writers Association, executive director of the National Committee of China Journalists Association, and general consultant of primary and secondary school textbooks published by People's Education Publishing House. He is a famous news theorist, essayist, popular science writer and political commentator. He has won many honorary titles such as National Youth Literature Award, Zhao Shuli Literature Award, National Excellent Popular Science Works Award and "Five Ones" Project Award of the Propaganda Department of the Communist Party of China.

The main works are the novel "Popular Romance of Mathematics and Physics" written by Zhang Hui in the history of science; News trilogy "Corner without News", "The Vein of News Green Leaves" and "Reflections on News Principles"; In terms of prose creation, in the past 20 years, he has won the tradition of classical landscape articles by focusing on landscape prose. His works are herbaceous and elegant. In recent years, he has devoted himself to the prose of figures, especially the writing of historical celebrities, "Find the ferry, find the ferry, and where to cross?" "Red Hair, Miki Sayaka" and so on have aroused great repercussions in the society. Prose collections include Summer Feelings and Qiu Si, Searching for New Places, Red Classics, Notes on Famous Mountains and Rivers, Outstanding People, Liang Heng Volume, etc. Academic collections include: the way of writing, inheritance and transcendence, approaching politics. Nine volumes of Liang Heng's collected works; He has won the Youth Literature Award, the Zhao Shuli Literature Award and the National Excellent Popular Science Works Award; "Five Ones" Project Award of the Propaganda Department of the CPC; There are also Jinci, summer feelings, finding a ferry, finding a ferry, and where to cross? Many essays such as "A Hundred Years of Beauty" and "Shooting Over the Rails" were selected as middle school textbooks.

His works have won the Youth Literature Award, Zhao Shuli Literature Award and National Excellent Popular Science Works Award; From 65438 to 0996, the essay "Suddenly Listening to the West" published in Foshan Literature and Art won the essay Excellence Award of "Heart is China" jointly organized by Mei Wen, Literature Freedom Talk and Foshan Literature and Art. Three essays, Golden Ci, Seeking Crossing, Seeking Crossing and Where Crossing, and Summer Feeling, were selected as middle school textbooks. In recent years, Hayes has also been selected as a middle school textbook of Hubei Education Press.