The Economic Times

In 1896, a French physicist accidentally discovered radioactivity after leaving uranium crystals on photographic plates wrapped in black paper inside a dark drawer

In 1896, a French physicist accidentally discovered radioactivity after leaving uranium crystals on photographic plates wrapped in black paper inside a dark drawer. Henri Becquerel found that uranium salts could expose photographic plates without sunlight. His work helped establish the study of radioactivity and later earned him the 1903 Nobel Prize in Physics with Marie and Pierre Curie.