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The Early Pioneers of Radioactivity

Marie Curie, Lise Meitner and Enrico Fermi

Edward Sierra will offer an engaging and informative presentation on the life and work of these early pioneers of radioactivity.

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Learn about influential historical figures starting with Marie Curie, who was the first woman to win a Nobel Prize for her work on the radiation phenomena. Curie is the only person awarded a Nobel Prize in two different sciences.

Lise Meitner was an Austrian and later Swedish physicist who worked on radioactivity and nuclear physics. She was one of the great experimentalists of her day. Einstein dubbed her “Our German Madame Curie” during their Berlin heyday in the roaring 1920s. Meitner is the unsung hero of nuclear fission, having played an essential role in its 1938 discovery.

Enrico Fermi was an Italian and naturalized American physicist – and one of the world’s most brilliant and productive scientists. In 1938 he was awarded the Nobel Prize in Physics. In January 1939, he moved to Columbia University and eventually the University of Chicago where he led the first controlled nuclear chain reaction. 

About the presenter
Edward A. Sierra began his career in the United States Navy. Upon completion of a two-year training program, Sierra reported to the Electrical Division onboard the U.S.S. Billfish SSN-676, which was a nuclear-powered fast attack submarine. He went on to work as a field operator at the Hope Creek Nuclear Power Station in New Jersey, and then as a nuclear reactor operator at Brookhaven National Laboratory. He is the President of the Long Island, New York Chapter of the American Nuclear Society. Sierra holds a Bachelor of Science degree from Thomas Edison State University and has earned graduate degrees from New York Institute of Technology, Dowling College and Marist College.