Written by: Sayuri Shrestha - 28017, Grade VI
Posted on: 21 September, 2021
Marie Skłodowska Curie, originally Maria, was born on November 7, 1867, in Warsaw, Poland. Marie Curie was a Polish physicist and chemist. She did research on radioactivity. She was the first woman professor at the University of Paris. She was also the first woman to win a Nobel Prize and the first person to win two Nobel Prizes, one in physics in 1903 and the other in chemistry in 1911.
Marie attended Flying University, a college that (illegally) welcomed female students and had to change locations several times to hide from authorities. She was the first woman in Paris to earn her doctorate degree.
Marie invented portable x-ray machines to help soldiers during World War I. The machines were called "petite Curies" (little Curies).
Marie and her husband created a theory of radioactivity (a term made by her and her husband Pierre Curie). They found different ways to separate radioactive isotopes and discovered two new elements: radium and polonium. The term polonium was named after Poland, her home country. She used her own studies in radioactivity to develop a new treatment for cancer. These treatments used radioactive isotopes.
In 1921, Marie founded the Curie Institute in Paris, which operates as a major cancer research facility to this day.
Marie Curie died on July 4, 1934 from overexposure to radiation. This was not only a result from her repeated exposure to radiation from her experiments, but also from her work with X-ray machines.
Reference: https://www.nobelprize.org/prizes/physics/1903/marie-curie/biographical/
