The Disappearing Spoon: And Other True Tales of Madness, Love, and the History of the World from the Periodic Table

Polish by birth, Marie Sklodowska moved to France, where she married fellow scientist Pierre Curie. She and her husband performed critical research on the nature of radiation, winning the 1903 Nobel Prize in Physics. In 1911 Marie won a second Nobel for the discovery of radium and polonium. Curie’s daughter, Irène, made further advances with polonium and won a Nobel in 1935. Both Marie and Irène died of cancers from radiation poisoning. Element 96, curium, is named for Marie Curie.

To improve the study of elements, Bunsen in the mid-1800s redesigned the laboratory burner, invented the spectroscope, and used them together to study the light emitted by heated atoms. This greatly sped up the discovery of new elements. Bunsen mentored Mendeleev, who developed the first periodic table.

As the 1900s began, German chemist Haber invented a way to make synthetic fertilizer, which revolutionized food production. During World War I, Haber weaponized his invention, creating bombs and poison gas. Haber also invented an insecticide, Zyklon B, which the Nazis later used in the gas chambers of concentration camps. 

Fermi reported in 1934 that he discovered new elements. Lise Meitner in 1939 proved that Fermi instead caused nuclear fission. By then, Fermi had already won the Nobel Prize for his work. In the 1940s Fermi headed the Manhattan Project, which created the first stable nuclear chain reaction, a precursor to the development of atom bombs. Fermi later asked, regarding the possibility of alien civilizations, “Where is everybody?” This became known as the Fermi Paradox.

In the 1920s, Pauling developed the quantum theory of electron bonding, which opened up new frontiers in chemistry and biology. Pauling tried and failed to be the first to decipher DNA in the early 1950s. Later, he partook in antiwar activities and promoted vitamin C as a cure for the common cold. Pauling won the Nobel chemistry prize in 1954 and the peace prize in 1962, making him, along with Marie Curie, one of two scientists to receive prizes in two categories.

Seaborg’s research team at Berkeley, California, discovered nearly one-sixth of all the elements. Seaborg refined the periodic table with his rearrangement of some of the heavy elements into the actinide series. Seaborg won the 1951 Nobel chemistry prize. A science advisor to several presidents, Seaborg became the namesake of element 106, seaborgium.

With Otto Hahn, Meitner in 1939 discovered nuclear fission, the principle behind atom bombs and nuclear power. Because she was Jewish, Meitner fled to Sweden from Nazi Germany, and her name didn’t appear on the research paper that earned Hahn the 1944 chemistry Nobel. Element 109, meitnerium, is named in her honor. 

Alvarez, who worked on radar and atomic bombs in World War II, won the 1968 Nobel Prize in Physics for his work in developing the bubble chambers that helped his science team discover new atomic particles. A strange band of iridium in rock layers 65 million years old puzzled Alvarez and his geologist son Walter, who realized that the iridium must have come from outer space in the form of a rock big enough to splash the metal all over the planet. The Alvarez duo proposed that the dinosaurs must have been killed off by a giant comet or asteroid

Segrè, a discoverer of multiple atoms and particles, was on the science team in 1934 that confirmed Fermi’s claim of finding the first elements beyond uranium. It was later realized that Fermi hadn’t discovered new elements but, instead, had caused elements to split, or fission, a much more important finding that led quickly to atomic bombs. Segrè discovered technetium but walked away from a chance to discover the first transuranic element, neptunium. Segrè escaped fascist Italy in 1938 and worked at Berkeley, where he helped Glenn Seaborg’s team discover a slew of new atoms.

In 1913, Moseley, a student of Rutherford, fired electrons at elements, causing them to emit X-rays, which he used to calculate the number of protons in each. In the process, Moseley showed that the proton count is the same as the atomic number, which supports Rutherford’s belief that each atom contains a central nucleus. Moseley died in battle in World War I.