Suffice it to evoke Hiroshima, Chernobyl or Cancer to confirm the relevance of 'nuclear things' for our understanding of the Twentieth Century. These three issues may structure the massive nuclear literature produced by history of science. First, the research undertaken at Los Alamos for the building of the atomic bomb has been perceived as a privileged site to explore scientific practices since World War II. Large research teams, expensive instruments, intimacy with political, military and economical powers, are all recognizable features of the Big Science phenomenon with which Physics' practices have come to been identified (GalHev92; Hod98). The historiography of Big Science opened perspectives for the writing of history of science broadly understood, namely with Peter Galison (Ga97) urging scholars to follow anthropologists and pay attention to the material culture of laboratories. Recently, John Krige (Kr06) placed nuclear issues at the center of the shaping of European science in the Cold war years under American hegemony, a major contribution for the current project purposes. Chernobyl leads us to literature connecting the history of science with environmental history. There is to be sure an impressive amount of literature dealing with nuclear issues from an environmental perspective, but an important gap, which we intend to contribute to overcome, remains between environmental history and history of science in nuclear literature. An important exception is the work of Paul Josephson (Jo02) that connects histories of technology, nature, and the state. Hevly and Findlay (HeFi98) also point to the relations this project is interested in between landscapes and nuclear facilities. Such gap doesn't exist in relation to medical research and its connections with the nuclear world. Soraya Boudia (Bou01) has explored the importance of radiotherapies for the development of Marie Curie's laboratory, and Ilana Löwy (Lo97) placed the expensive instruments delivering radium radiation in cancer networks weaving together patients, physicians, charities and politicians. The intertwined history of cancer and radioactivity remains unexplored for Portugal. This is striking considering that the physicians involved in the founding of the Portuguese Institute of Oncology (IPO) in 1923 were main actors in making laboratory medicine a crucial element of the Republican regime (1910-1926) (Am06). We expect that by following the material practices of radioactivity we will be able not only to cover an important gap in Portuguese historiography of science but also to better grasp the role of physicians and physicists in the building of the Republic (1910-1926). General historical accounts of the authoritarian New State (1926-1974) have also been oblivious to the role of scientists (Ro94). The understandable concern with the repressive character of the regime has led historians to stress the difficulties of experimental life under Salazar's rule (BrGil06). Two master theses by M. Amélia Taveira (Ta03) and M. Júlia Gaspar (Ga08) have placed the subject of nuclear research in Portugal more in tune with international history of science. These two studies are important starting points for our research, but both their short range of subjects and sources don't provide an answer about the significance of nuclear histories to the contemporary history of Portugal. We still have to make use of Gabrielle Hecht (He98) and Itty Abraham (Ab98) to perceive how nuclear issues may be taken as major components of national histories. Both authors intertwine reactors with national political and cultural debates in post war France and post colonial India. Our final aim is to produce a similar narrative for Portugal, but with the category ‘nuclear' covering a broader range than just nuclear reactors. Actually, Gabrielle Hecht (He07) has changed her focus to uranium mining as an important place in the negotiation of what counts as nuclear. Such an approach is close to our goal of revealing a nuclear Portugal by looking at reactors, as well as to mines, cancer institutes and green movements. The international scholarship has already produced contributions on all those different issues, but it has not attempted to weave together all features in one narrative. The intention here is not just to put Portuguese history of science in tune with international trends, but also to make original contributions to the international literature. The PI has already explored the role of science and technology in forging a national identity (Sar07) and has produced an account of the importance of looking at laboratory sites for anyone interested in understanding Portuguese contemporary history (Sar05). He has worked together with other team members in exploring recent configurations of Portuguese science, namely of nuclear research (SaDeBa08). The joint participation of ICS and CES will bring to the project the two most productive communities of science studies' scholars in the country as certified by recent publications (ArrRoq08). It is also at ICS and CES that one finds the most active researchers in following environmental controversies related with nuclear issues (Sch03; DelBas07). The ability of the research team to use ethnographic methodologies to approach technoscientific objects is asserted by previous works of its members, namely Granjo (Gr04), Praça (Pr08), Arriscado Nunes (Arr01) and Roque (Roq08). The joint presence of CIUHCT and ICS will strength the strong ties between the communities of historians of science of both institutions that are currently responsible for editing the sole journal of history of science in the country (Sar07B). The recognition of their research has been confirmed by publications in major international journals (LafSar04; DiCarSim01).