History of chemistry element among the fractions that resulted. Working with the mineral pitchblende, the pair discovered a new radioactive element in 1898. They named the element polonium, after Marie's native country of Poland. On December 21, 1898, the Curies detected the presence of another radioactive material in the pitchblende. They presented this finding to the French Academy of Sciences on December 26, proposing that the new element be called radium. The Curies then went to work isolating polonium and radium from naturally occurring compounds to prove that they were new elements. In 1902, the Curies announced that they had produced a decigram
Uranium ore Mineralization may be primary, that is magmatic-related or as secondary mineralization due to leaching, remobilization and re-precipitation. The principal uranium mineral in volcanic deposits is pitchblende, which is usually associated with molybdenite and minor amounts of lead, tin and tungsten mineralization. Volcanic hosted uranium deposits occur in host rocks spanning the Precambrian to the Cenozoic but because of the shallow levels at which they form, preservation favors younger age deposits. Some of the more important deposits or districts are Streltsovskoye, Russia; Dornod, Mongolia; and McDermitt, Nevada. The average deposit size is rather small with grades of 0.02% to 0.2% UO.