Marie Curie Physicist

Her Life

Her name is Marie Sklodowska Curie she was a Polish and naturalized-French physicist who studied/conducted pioneering research on radioactivity. Marie was born on November 7, 1867, in Warsaw, Poland. She is the first woman to win a Nobel Prize and the only woman to win the award in two different fields. Marie completed her master's degree in physics in 1893 and when she received a commission to do a study on different types of steel and their magnetic properties, Marie needed a lab to work in, and a colleague introduced her to French physicist Pierre Curie. A romance developed between the brilliant pair, and lead to their marriage on July 26, 1895.

Educational Background

As a child Marie took after her father, Wladyslaw, a math and physics instructor, she had a bright mind and excelled at school. Marie was a top student in her secondary school, Marie couldn't attend the men-only University of Warsaw so instead she continued her education in Warsaw's "floating university," a set of underground, informal classes. She used her spare time to study, reading about physics, chemistry and math also in 1891, Curie finally made her way to Paris where she enrolled at the Sorbonne. Allowing her to complete her master's degree in physics in 1893 and earn another degree in mathematics the following year.

Accomplishments

She is the first woman to win a Nobel Prize and the only woman to win the award in two different fields (physics and chemistry). She led to the discovery of polonium and radium and, after Pierre's death, the further development of X-rays. Curie received another great honor in 1911, winning her second Nobel Prize, this time in chemistry, she was selected for her discovery of radium and polonium, and became the first scientist to win two Nobel Prizes. She championed the use of portable X-ray machines in the field

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