 | As part of a symposium honoring the 100th anniversary of Marie Curie's first Nobel Prize, area high school students and their teachers were invited to campus for a morning of tours and presentations about the excitement of scientific research. Here, Kiyaniah Davis (foreground, left) and Clarissa Cooper of Career High School visit an exhibition about Curie at the Cushing/Whitney Medical Library. |
An interdisciplinary symposium held Nov. 6-8 celebrated the centenary of the awarding of Marie Curie's first Nobel Prize and examined the impact of women in science through lectures and panel discussions.
The Nov. 6 session, "The Intellectual Journey of Marie Curie," emphasized the interplay between the sciences and humanities in Curie's life and her impact on the participation of generations of women in science.
Merle Waxman of Yale's Office for Women in Medicine noted that, in her conversations with women faculty, Curie is "acknowledged as the ultimate role model, renowned and revered by everyone."
In his talk, "Marie Curie in America," Yale history professor Daniel Kevles said that after winning the Nobel Prize twice, Curie came to America in 1921 to get support for her laboratory and a gift of radium to continue her work. Kevles noted that Curie was portrayed as timid, shy, motherly and impoverished -- which, he said, reflected a backlash in response to the suffrage and feminist movements.
Kevles added that, despite her many awards and honorary degrees -- including one from Yale -- Curie was denied membership in the National Academy of Sciences on the grounds that it would have to address the question of whether to admit any women at all. Yet, she stated on her return to France, "men in America approve and encourage the aspirations of women."
In "Two in a Shed: History and Memory of the Curies as a Nobel Prize-winning Couple," Helena Pycior of the University of Wisconsin spoke about Curie's marriage, research and Nobel awards. She noted that Curie received the 1903 Nobel Prize as a result of her husband's intervention -- the award originally was planned for only Pierre Curie and Henri Bequerel. This prize, in physics, was awarded for research on radiation phenomenon, not Marie Curie's discovery of the new elements radium and polonium, noted Pycior -- for that she would later receive a Nobel award in chemistry.
From the time of Pierre Curie's accidental death in 1906, Pycior said, Marie Curie dedicated herself to a commemoration of his memory -- what she called her "religion of memory." In that context, noted Pycior, Curie played an instrumental role in the building of the Radium Institute in Paris; delivered her Nobel acceptance lecture in 1911 as "homage to the memory of Pierre Curie"; and made her plea for a new laboratory and radium in America to further the research on treating cancer, a one of her husband's special areas of interest.
In examining Marie Curie's life and legacy, Yale radiation scientist Sara Rockwell noted that Curie was one of two women to be "licensed" in science, and one of five in mathematics. She was the first woman to be awarded a Ph.D. in Europe, and the first woman to win a Nobel Prize. Rockwell pointed out that Curie discovered that radioactivity was an atomic property, not a chemical property, and that an unknown element could be discovered by showing that it had radioactivity different from that of other elements, and purified by following the increase in specific radioactivity.
Other speakers at the symposium discussed the contributions of women scientists in the 20th century. Kevles presented a talk for Brenda Maddox, who was unable to attend due to illness. The talk, "Rosalind Franklin and the Discovery of the Structure of DNA," explained how Franklin was notorious for not winning the Nobel Prize -- despite the fact that her micrographs were instrumental for Watson and Crick to postulate their model of the structure of DNA, for which they later won the Nobel Prize with Maurice Hugh Frederick Wilkins.
Another featured speaker was Elga Wasserman, author of the book "Door in the Dream," which looks at the inspiration, motivation and lives of 26 women scientists elected to the National Academy of Sciences (including two of the participants in the conference, Joan Steitz and Vera Rubin). In her talk, Wasserman said the interviews she conducted for the book demonstrated the very prevalent "hidden" persona of publicly successful women in science. "A gulf between separate portraits of the same woman scientist is not at all unique," said Wasserman.
Speaker Bettyann Kevles of Yale discussed "The Special Case of Women Astronauts." Fifty years after Curie's early work, the space program opened a new area of science to women, said Kevles. From 1959 to 1978 all American astronauts were men, she noted, while Soviet women were officially equal and part of their program from the beginning.
On Nov. 7, the Curie symposium also welcomed 100 Connecticut high school students and their teachers from Hill Regional Career, Sound School, High School in the Community and Hopkins in New Haven; Staples in Westport; and Sacred Heart in Hamden. The students explored a Curie exhibit in the Cushing/Whitney Medical Library rotunda containing photographs and artifacts from Marie Curie's life, including an original copy of the thesis for which she won the Nobel Prize in 1903.
After a tour of the exhibit, the students met with a panel of six women scientists discussing what it takes to be a woman scientist today. Some speakers focused on the training required, while others discussed the need for support and encouragement of friends, family and mentors. All emphasized the excitement and satisfaction of discovery -- of creating new molecules, of having an impact on healthcare or of finding structure in the universe. The students also watched clips of "Marie Curie," the 1943 Hollywood movie.
In introducing a symposium panel in the Law School later that day, President Richard C. Levin stated that Curie's "legacy should be cherished and stand as an emblem of human accomplishment." He spoke further of the Yale initiatives for development of facilities and faculty in the sciences and medicine, and of the curriculum review insuring that "all of our students will graduate scientifically and quantitatively prepared for 21st-century citizenship."
Noting the importance of the people and collaborations that are the heart of the University, Levin said Yale paid "constant attention to seeking out, nurturing and promoting women of the highest quality. We will not cease in our efforts to get to parity for women in science. "
The three women scientists speaking on the "Frontiers in Chemistry, Astrophysics and Biology" demonstrated how far Curie's work has grown. Jacqueline Barton, a bio-inorganic chemist from the California Institute of Technology, discussed DNA from the perspective of what happens when electrons are displaced from their normal stable structure, and how this may be harnessed as a diagnostic tool for genetic detection of disease.
Vera Rubin, an astrophysicist from the Carnegie Institution, spoke about the "dark matter" that comprises the universe at the level of galaxies. Yale faculty member Joan Steitz, the Sterling Professor of Molecular Biophysics and Biochemistry at Yale, detailed the new directions in molecular biology that are growing from the recognition of small nuclear RNAs as regulators in the processing and translation of genetic messages.
The program concluded on Nov. 8 with a session on "Challenges in Science and Technology in the 21st Century," moderated by Yale Provost Susan Hockfield. The featured speakers were Bruce Alberts, president of the National Academy of Sciences; Shirley Tilghman, president of Princeton University; and Charles Vest, president of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology.
In her presentation, Tilghman said: "By encouraging a broader cross-section of the population to become scientists we potentially increase the range of scientific problems that are under investigation. The single most effective thing a university can do is to promote among students, faculty and staff a healthy balance between family and work."
-- By Janet Rettig Emanuel
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