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Frédéric Joliot-Curie
1900–1958 · France · Born 1900–1939
Nobel Chemistry 1935
French physicist-chemist, son-in-law of Marie Curie, who discovered artificial radioactivity and later led France's first atomic reactor programme.
Nobel-winning work
With Irène Joliot-Curie, he discovered artificial radioactivity: bombarding aluminium with alpha particles produced a radioactive phosphorus isotope not found in nature. The synthesis of new radioactive elements opened the era of artificial radionuclides, now central to nuclear medicine and radiochemistry.
Fields
Related topics
Isotopes, α, β, γ decay
The nuclear algebra of nuclide notation and decay modes, balancing nuclear equations, and mapping the 14-step uranium-238 decay chain.
Synthesis of new elements
How accelerator beams and radioactive actinide targets push the boundary of the periodic table toward the island of stability through heavy-ion fusion-evaporation.