BECQUEREL, HENRI

born Dec. 15, 1852, Paris, France died Aug. 25, 1908, Le Croisic in full Antoine-Henri Becquerel French physicist who discovered radioactivity through his investigations of uranium and other substances. In 1903 he shared the Nobel Prize for Physics with Pierre and Marie Curie. He was a member of a scientific family extending through several generations, the most notable being his grandfather Antoine-Csar Becquerel (1788-1878), his father, Alexandre-Edmond Becquerel (1820-91), and his son Jean Becquerel (1878-1953). Additional reading There is no full-length biography of Becquerel in English. The article on him by Alfred Romer in the Dictionary of Scientific Biography, vol. 1 (1970), pp. 558-561, provides further details.