ELI5: Explain Like I'm 5

Heinrich Burkhardt

Heinrich Burkhardt was a person who lived a long time ago, before you were even born! He was a scientist who studied rocks and minerals. He liked to look at them under a microscope and figure out what they were made of.

One of the things he was very interested in was something called radioactivity. This is when certain rocks and minerals give off a special kind of energy that we can't see or hear. It's kind of like how your toys give off energy when you play with them and then they run out of energy and you have to put in new batteries or plug them in to charge. But with radioactivity, it's a little bit different.

Heinrich Burkhardt studied radioactivity for a long time and discovered a lot of important things about it. He found out that some rocks and minerals are more radioactive than others, and that some of them can even be dangerous if you're around them for too long.

He also discovered something called radioactive decay, which is when a radioactive material breaks down over time and turns into something else. Like how a banana turns brown over time and then eventually turns into mush.

So even though Heinrich Burkhardt is not around anymore, we still remember him for all the important things he discovered about radioactivity and the rocks and minerals they come from.