Curie’s X-ray ambulances
Stories from Physics
for 11-14
14-16
Marie Curie responded rapidly to the outbreak of the First World War: within 10 days of the mobilisation of French troops, she had received a document from the Minister of War authorising her to organise radiological workers into mobile units. She raised funds for a team of medics in cars equipped with X-ray equipment, working with a surgeon to control the apparatus to image bones and detect foreign bodies in tissues. The X-ray vehicles became known as ‘les petites Curies’
References
S. Dry, Curie, London, Haus Publishing, 2003, pp. 97-101.
M. A. Mills, & M. P. Mills, The Invention of the War Machine. The New Atlantis, 3-23, 2014, p. 8.
