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Remembering China's 'Marie Curie'
By Tan Weiyun |
June 10, 2012, Sunday
|
Print Edition
Print Edition
Few Chinese women today make a big name for themselves in the sciences and there's still a sense that science is not for women, that it's a "man's field." And it's a rare woman who resists pressure to conform.
But in earlier days, despite prejudice, it appears that Chinese women were less reluctant to tackle the hard sciences.
One of them was Chien-Shiung Wu (1912-97), a renowned Chinese-American physicist at Columbia University, known as the "Chinese Marie Curie" for her work in experimental physics and radioactivity. She was the world's distinguished female physicist of her time.
Wu lived in the United States for 37 years, returning for visits to China starting in 1973 after President Richard Nixon "opened the door." She died in New York at the age of 84.
Her birth centenary was recently celebrated in her hometown of Liuhe, Taicang City in Jiangsu Province. Her tombstone bears the inscription "Forever Chinese."
Marie Curie (1867-1934), to whom she is compared in China, was a French-Polish physicist and chemist famous for discovering radium and for her pioneering work in radiation research.
Wu worked on the Manhattan Project, the secret US military project to build an atomic weapon in World War II before the Germans did. She later expressed great sadness over the use of the atomic bombs over Hiroshima and Nagasaki.
She is best known, however, for her 1956 experiment that disproved the "law of conservation of parity," once considered an immutable law of physics. Those experiments won the Nobel Prize the following year for the two theoretical physicists who had first doubted it, Tsung-Dao Lee and Chen-Ning Yang, who were guest scientists at the Brookhaven National Laboratory in New York Statte.
"C.S. Wu was one of the giants of physics. In the field of beta decay, she had no equal," said Tsung-Dao Lee, university professor at Columbia.
Wu was born in Shanghai but her hometown was the picturesque town of Liuhe, around 40 miles from Shanghai. She was born into a scholar's family and her father Wu Zhongyi, who was active in the Revolution of 1911, was a proponent of gender equality. He founded the Mingde Women's Vocational School, where girls learned sewing, embroidery and gardening, in addition to Chinese culture, literature and science.
As a girl Wu was fascinated by science, read extensively and spent hours studying an old radio, taking it apart and putting it back together. She gave it to a tea house so villagers could enjoy local operas and listen to the news.
Wu attended the No. 2 Suzhou Women's Normal School, where she studied math and physics. In 1930 she was admitted to the National Central University, majoring in physics.
In 1936, China was in turmoil. Wu was 24 and left for the United States to further her studies. She worked with Ernest O. Lawrence, who won the Nobel Prize in physics in 1939 for inventing the cyclotron particle accelerator. She married physicist Chia-Liu Yuan.
In 1944, Wu joined the Manhattan Project, but she didn't expect her doctoral dissertation to play an important role in the bomb development project.
Her nephew Wu Su told Shanghai Daily at the centenary observation that his aunt lamented the use of the atomic bomb. "We worked on the project not to kill. On the contrary, we did it for peace," he quoted her as saying. "Do you think humans would be so foolish as to destroy themselves? No, absolutely not. I have confidence in my fellows and I believe we will live in peace one day."
At home in New York City, she often recalled her early days in Taicang. Her nephew, who also lived in the US, recalled that her favorite dishes were braised pork balls in soy sauce and sauteed broad beans, local favorites. She liked to reminisce about her father and her childhood in China.
After the Nobel Prize in physics was awarded to Chinese-born Lee and Yang, many scientists said it was unfair that Wu was not also recognized for her fundamental work in verifying experiments.
"I could see she was a little frustrated when we talked about it," Wu Su said. "But my auntie soon thought it through. She told me many times she did it because she loved science and physics, not for fame."
Wu frequently wore qipao and she kept an extensive collection of Chinese classic literature in her apartment at Columbia University where she lived for more than three decades.
A year after Nixon's ice-breaking trip to China, Wu was then 61 years old. She put on her qipao and paid her first visit to China, which she had left 37 years earlier. She visited Mingde Women's Vocational School and her hometown.
She and her husband made more than 10 trips to China. She set up scholarships in Taicang, sponsored a primary school and invited the world's leading physicists to lecture at Nanjing and Southeast universities, formerly the National Central University, her alma mater.
But in earlier days, despite prejudice, it appears that Chinese women were less reluctant to tackle the hard sciences.
One of them was Chien-Shiung Wu (1912-97), a renowned Chinese-American physicist at Columbia University, known as the "Chinese Marie Curie" for her work in experimental physics and radioactivity. She was the world's distinguished female physicist of her time.
Wu lived in the United States for 37 years, returning for visits to China starting in 1973 after President Richard Nixon "opened the door." She died in New York at the age of 84.
Her birth centenary was recently celebrated in her hometown of Liuhe, Taicang City in Jiangsu Province. Her tombstone bears the inscription "Forever Chinese."
Marie Curie (1867-1934), to whom she is compared in China, was a French-Polish physicist and chemist famous for discovering radium and for her pioneering work in radiation research.
Wu worked on the Manhattan Project, the secret US military project to build an atomic weapon in World War II before the Germans did. She later expressed great sadness over the use of the atomic bombs over Hiroshima and Nagasaki.
She is best known, however, for her 1956 experiment that disproved the "law of conservation of parity," once considered an immutable law of physics. Those experiments won the Nobel Prize the following year for the two theoretical physicists who had first doubted it, Tsung-Dao Lee and Chen-Ning Yang, who were guest scientists at the Brookhaven National Laboratory in New York Statte.
"C.S. Wu was one of the giants of physics. In the field of beta decay, she had no equal," said Tsung-Dao Lee, university professor at Columbia.
Wu was born in Shanghai but her hometown was the picturesque town of Liuhe, around 40 miles from Shanghai. She was born into a scholar's family and her father Wu Zhongyi, who was active in the Revolution of 1911, was a proponent of gender equality. He founded the Mingde Women's Vocational School, where girls learned sewing, embroidery and gardening, in addition to Chinese culture, literature and science.
As a girl Wu was fascinated by science, read extensively and spent hours studying an old radio, taking it apart and putting it back together. She gave it to a tea house so villagers could enjoy local operas and listen to the news.
Wu attended the No. 2 Suzhou Women's Normal School, where she studied math and physics. In 1930 she was admitted to the National Central University, majoring in physics.
In 1936, China was in turmoil. Wu was 24 and left for the United States to further her studies. She worked with Ernest O. Lawrence, who won the Nobel Prize in physics in 1939 for inventing the cyclotron particle accelerator. She married physicist Chia-Liu Yuan.
In 1944, Wu joined the Manhattan Project, but she didn't expect her doctoral dissertation to play an important role in the bomb development project.
Her nephew Wu Su told Shanghai Daily at the centenary observation that his aunt lamented the use of the atomic bomb. "We worked on the project not to kill. On the contrary, we did it for peace," he quoted her as saying. "Do you think humans would be so foolish as to destroy themselves? No, absolutely not. I have confidence in my fellows and I believe we will live in peace one day."
At home in New York City, she often recalled her early days in Taicang. Her nephew, who also lived in the US, recalled that her favorite dishes were braised pork balls in soy sauce and sauteed broad beans, local favorites. She liked to reminisce about her father and her childhood in China.
After the Nobel Prize in physics was awarded to Chinese-born Lee and Yang, many scientists said it was unfair that Wu was not also recognized for her fundamental work in verifying experiments.
"I could see she was a little frustrated when we talked about it," Wu Su said. "But my auntie soon thought it through. She told me many times she did it because she loved science and physics, not for fame."
Wu frequently wore qipao and she kept an extensive collection of Chinese classic literature in her apartment at Columbia University where she lived for more than three decades.
A year after Nixon's ice-breaking trip to China, Wu was then 61 years old. She put on her qipao and paid her first visit to China, which she had left 37 years earlier. She visited Mingde Women's Vocational School and her hometown.
She and her husband made more than 10 trips to China. She set up scholarships in Taicang, sponsored a primary school and invited the world's leading physicists to lecture at Nanjing and Southeast universities, formerly the National Central University, her alma mater.
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