Look a little closer
In 1895, Wilhelm Röntgen noticed a fluorescent screen glowing even though his cathode-ray tube was covered. An unknown kind of radiation was passing through the barrier, so he called it X-radiation.
His famous image of his wife Bertha's hand showed bones and a ring inside living tissue. Doctors could suddenly locate fractures and foreign objects without opening the body.
The risks were not understood at first, and early users suffered radiation injuries. X-rays transformed medicine, but they also taught science that invisible tools can carry invisible hazards.
