What does millicurie mean?
A millicurie is a unit used to measure radioactivity. It represents one thousandth of a curie, or 3.7 million radioactive disintegrations per second, and is commonly encountered in medicine, radiation safety, and scientific research. In clinical settings, the activity of a radioactive tracer or treatment may be specified in millicuries, allowing practitioners to describe the strength of a dose clearly. Although the unit is small in numerical terms, it corresponds to a substantial number of radioactive events. The term is named after the physicist Marie Curie, whose pioneering research established the foundations for understanding radioactivity. In modern scientific writing, the SI unit becquerel is also widely used, but millicuries remain familiar in medicine and historical radiation terminology.
nounA unit of radioactivity equal to one thousandth of a curie, equivalent to 3.7 million radioactive disintegrations per second. The millicurie is used in medicine, radiation safety, and scientific measurement.
- A unit of radioactivity equal to one thousandth of a curie.
"The test was administered using a small dose measured in millicuries."
"Medical tracer doses may be administered in millicuries."
"The laboratory recorded the sample's activity as twelve millicuries."
The standard plural is millicuries.
"The two samples had very different activities, measured in millicuries."
A single millicurie is tiny as a unit but represents 3.7 million radioactive disintegrations every second.
Reviewed by Deb Chak, Editor. AI-assisted content curated by RJS Tech Solutions LLP.
Where does millicurie come from?
The word millicurie combines the prefix milli-, meaning one thousandth, with curie, a unit named in honor of Marie and Pierre Curie. The curie was defined as the activity of one gram of radium, and the millicurie was established as a smaller unit equal to one thousandth of that amount. The nomenclature reflects the central role of the Curie family in the early study of radioactivity.
Related word forms
How millicurie is actually used
The term is primarily used in scientific, medical, and industrial contexts. It is less common in everyday language, where radioactivity is often described using units such as becquerels.
Easily confused with millicurie
A curie is a larger unit of radioactivity, while a millicurie equals one thousandth of a curie.