Definition

Noun: 1. A unit of radioactivity: A scientific unit used to measure the intensity or activity of a radioactive substance. One curie represents a rate of decay of 37 billion atomic nuclei per second. 2. Pierre Curie: A French physicist (1859-1906), husband of Marie Curie, who shared the 1903 Nobel Prize in Physics for research on radiation phenomena. 3. Marie Curie: A French-Polish chemist and physicist (1867-1934) who conducted pioneering research on radioactivity. She was the first woman to win a Nobel Prize, winning the 1903 Nobel Prize in Physics (shared with Pierre Curie and Henri Becquerel) and the 1911 Nobel Prize in Chemistry for her discovery of radium and polonium.

Usage Examples

• As a unit of measurement:
  • The old medical device contained a radium source with an activity of several curies.
  • The radioactivity of the sample was measured at 0.5 curie.
• Referring to the scientists:
  • Curie's groundbreaking work laid the foundation for nuclear physics. (This often refers to Marie Curie, but context determines which).
  • The research partnership of Pierre and Marie Curie was highly productive.

Advanced Usage

• SI Unit Replacement: In the modern International System of Units (SI), the curie (Ci) has been largely replaced by the becquerel (Bq), where 1 curie = 3.7 × 10¹⁰ becquerels. However, the curie is still used in some fields, like medicine and nuclear engineering.
• Common Prefixes: The unit is often used with metric prefixes for smaller amounts, such as the millicurie (mCi, one-thousandth of a curie) or microcurie (µCi, one-millionth of a curie).

Variants and Related Words

• Curie point (noun): Also called Curie temperature. The critical temperature above which a ferromagnetic material loses its permanent magnetism. This property is named after Pierre Curie.
• Curium (noun): A synthetic, radioactive chemical element (symbol Cm, atomic number 96) named in honor of Pierre and Marie Curie.

Synonyms

• For the unit: Ci (the standard abbreviation). While not a direct synonym, the becquerel (Bq) is the related SI unit.
• For the scientists: There are no direct synonyms. They may be referred to by their full names, Marie Curie or Pierre Curie, or as the Curies when referring to the couple.

Related Idioms or Phrases

• A curie of...: This phrasing is used to specify the radioactivity of a material.
  • The laboratory handled sources containing a curie of cobalt-60.

Noun

1. French chemist (born in Poland) who won two Nobel prizes; one (with her husband and Henri Becquerel) for research on radioactivity and another for her discovery of radium and polonium (1867-1934)
2. French physicist; husband of Marie Curie (1859-1906)
3. a unit of radioactivity equal to the amount of a radioactive isotope that decays at the rate of 37,000,000,000 disintegrations per second