When we have an accident and end up in the emergency room, it is quite possible the doctor will ask for an X-ray to help ascertain the severity of any damage. This is so much less painful than having someone manipulate a limb to find out if a bone is broken.
So whom do we have to thank for this benefit to mankind? It was in 1895 that the Professor of Physics at the University of Wurzburg, Bavaria, Wilhelm Conrad Roentgen discovered X-rays.
The future Nobel Prize winner was born in 1845, at Lennep (situated in the Lower Rhine Province of Germany). He was educated in the Netherlands and earned a PhD in Zurich, Switzerland. He worked in the universities of Strasbourg, Wurttemberg and Giessen prior to taking up his post at Wurzburg in 1888.
At Wurzburg, Roentgen was studying the properties of cathode rays when he discovered his new rays, which, as he could not ascertain their nature, he called X-rays. He observed the affects of the rays when he enclosed a discharge tube with a black carton and found that in a darkened room, rays produced would produce fluorescence on a paper plate coated with barium platinocyanide. Further testing revealed these rays penetrated materials of different densities to different extents to reveal an internal picture.
Roentgen produced the first X-ray photograph (called at that time a roentgenogram) of a human limb revealing the bone structure. The X-ray of his wife’s hand clearly shows her finger bones and her wedding ring,
Medicine soon started to use this valuable technology when Dr. John Macintyre of the Glasgow Royal Infirmary, Scotland opened one of the first radiology departments in 1896. During the Boer war and World War 1 X-ray technology proved to be a life-saver, allowing surgeons to find the site of a bullet or piece of shrapnel within the body of a wounded soldier prior to starting surgery.
Further work on X-rays revealed their potential to damage living tissue if used in excess. Even this property has proved useful, as radiology treatment is important in the treatment of some cancers.
Wilhelm Conrad Roentgen was awarded the Nobel Prize for Physics in 1901. More recently man-made element atomic number 111 was named in his honor, Roentgenium. The unit used in measuring ionizing radiation is the roentgen.
Professor Roentgen, the man who discovered X-rays, died on February 10, 1923 of intestinal cancer.
Reference Sources:
British Library – Learning Bodies of Knowledge
Nobel Lectures, Physics 1901-1921, Elsevier Publishing Company, Amsterdam, 1967
