Summary

Life becomes difficult for the Curies after their ground-breaking discovery. Pierre struggles to obtain a professorship that might come with a laboratory in which the couple can continue their work. With no lab in sight, Marie gains a position teaching at a college called the Higher Normal School for Girls near Sevres. This increases their income and their workload. They hardly rest, save for bicycling holidays in the summer.

The Curies publish numerous "scientific communications" on the nature of radium, pointing to its many uses, from aiding in photography to conducting electricity and treating cancer. A lucrative industry springs up around Marie's discovery. The University of Paris awards Marie her doctorate in June of 1903, soon after which Marie refuses to capitalize on her discovery by taking out a patient...