2. Her Childhood
● She was born in Poland. She was the
first person to obtain two Nobel prizes in
two fields
● She was the fifth daughter of a secondary
education teacher of physics and
mathematics, when she was a child she
spoke 4 languages fluently.
3. ● When she was ten years old,
Marie attended boarding
school J. Sikorska, then she
moved to a gymnasium
(school) for girls
A few years later, She made
an agreement with her sister,
she was going to help her
financially with her medical
studies in Paris in exchange
for similar assistance two
years later
4. Her studies
● At the age of 24 she went to Paris to develop a
scientific career, she survived with her savings after
having worked as a governess in Warsaw,
● In 1893, she finished her career and a year later she
met her husband Pierre Curie
5. Her discovery
● Using piezoelectric techniques Marie
measured the uranium radiations in the
uraninite and discovered that the
radiations of this mineral were stronger
than those of the uranium itself; that is
the reason why she determined that
there had to be other even more
radioactive elements
6. The couple’s discovery
● In 1898, the couple announced
the discovery of two new
elements: polonium and radium,
because they still had to spend
four years working in precarious
conditions to prove their
existence.
7. The first Nobel and Pierre’s job
● They were awarded the Nobel Prize
in Physics in 1903
In 1904 and Pierre Curie was
appointed professor of physics at the
University of Paris,
8. Pierre’s death
● In 1906, Pierre was killed by a
horse-drawn carriage. Marie
continued with her work and
inherited the chair at the Sorbonne
that her husband had occupied,
which she combined with her
research on radio and its
compounds, which led her to win
the Nobel Prize in Chemistry in
1911
9. Marie’s death
A few months after his last visit to Poland in the
spring of 1934, Marie died on July 4 at
Sancellemoz Sanatorium, because of aplastic
anemia, probably contracted by the radiation to
which she was exposed in her work.
She was also exposed without X-ray protection
while working as a radiologist in field hospitals
during the war.
Marie was the first woman to be buried in the
pantheon of Paris with her husband.
10. The Curios
● The Curio (symbol Ci) is a unit of
radioactivity which was named in
honor of Marie and her husband
(but the commission that decided
the name never clearly stated
whether they did it by honoring
Pierre, Marie or both).
11. Marie’s books
-Skłodowska-Curie, M (1910). I tried
radioactivity. Two volumes (in
French). Paris: Gauthier-Villars.
- (1921). The radiology et la guerre
(in French). Paris: Librairie Felix
Alcan.
- (1923). Pierre Curie (in French). Paris:
Payot.
-(1924). «Recueil des conférences-
rapports de documentation sur la
physique: L'Isotopie et les éléments
isotopes». Journal de Physique (in
French) IX (2) (Paris: Blanchard in
Komm)