Discovery Information
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Who: G.T.Seaborg, R.A.James, A. Ghiorso |
When: 1944 |
Where: United States |
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Name Origin
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In honor of Pierre and Marie Curie. |
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Sources
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Made by bombarding plutonium with helium ions. So radioactive it glows in the dark.
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Uses
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As curium is only available in extremely limited quantities, it has few uses, however, it was used on a Mars mission as an
alpha particle source for the Alpha Proton X-Ray Spectrometer.
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Notes
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The isotope curium-248 has been synthesized only in milligram quantities, but curium-242 and curium-244 are made in multigram amounts,
which allows for the determination of some of the element's properties.
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Curium bio-accumulates in bone tissue where its radiation destroys bone marrow and thus stops red blood cell creation. |