The radium is a rare chemical element that carries the atomic number 88. The white, luminous metal is known for its highly radioactivity. The radioactive elements are known for their unseen radioactive rays.
Radium was discovered in North Bohemia, in the Czech Republic. The radium is considered one of the most expensive elements in earth, it is extracted out from the ore material of uranium, which is uraninite. Seven grams of radium can be extracted out from a ton of the ore uraninite also called pitchblende.
The polonium is very expensive element that can be extracted out from the ore of the uranium. One hundred micrograms of polonium can be extracted from metric ton of uraninite.
Polonium is used as a power and heat source in satellites and spacecrafts, in the radioisotope thermoelectric generators to produce electricity and polonium is the element that help in releasing neutrons.
Henri Becquerel (1852-1908)
In the year 1896, Henri Becquerel (1852-1908) a French physicist, while working with his discovery on the phenomenon of radioactivity, he noticed that the uranium emits more radioactive rays than the X-rays, as a friend of Marie and Pierre Curie he mentioned this note to them who got very interested of the topic.
Marie Curie (1867-1934) who was a Polish birth and a French physicist and chemist. Pierre Curie (1859-1906) who was a French physicist, started working on the uraninite to look for the radioactive elements that are causing the radiation. They reached of 100 milligrams of radium from tons of uraninite. They found that the new element, which is radium, is powerful than the uranium. They also reached to the element polonium.
Marie and Pierre Curie with Henri Becquerel received the Noble Prize in Physics for their break through discovery for the radioactive elements.
Later in the year 1910, Marie Curie with André-Louis Debierne (1874-1949) who was a French chemist, have reached for the pure metal radium.
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