Marie Curie

Maria Skłodowska was born on November 7, 1867, in Warsaw, then under Russian imperial administration. Her father, Władysław Skłodowski, was a teacher of physics and mathematics; her mother, Bronisława, a schoolteacher and headmistress. Her mother died of tuberculosis in 1878, when Maria was ten years old.

Under Russian rule, the University of Warsaw was closed to women. To pursue higher education, Maria and her older sister Bronisława entered into a practical arrangement: Maria would work as a governess in Poland to fund Bronisława's medical studies in Paris; once Bronisława had established herself, she would in turn support Maria's studies. Maria spent five years as a governess in the Polish countryside, largely in the employ of the Żorawski family, during which time she taught herself advanced mathematics and continued her education informally. She also taught workers' children in violation of Russian laws prohibiting Polish-language instruction.

She arrived in Paris in November 1891. She studied physics and mathematics at the Sorbonne (then the Faculté des Sciences of the University of Paris), completing her physics degree in 1893 — first in her class — and her mathematics degree in 1894. She met the physicist Pierre Curie in 1894; they married in July 1895. They had two daughters: Irène (born 1897) and Ève (born 1904).

Her doctoral research focused on uranium rays, following Wilhelm Röntgen's discovery of X-rays in 1895 and Henri Becquerel's discovery that uranium salts emitted radiation spontaneously. She coined the term "radioactivity" to describe this phenomenon. Working in a damp, poorly ventilated shed at the School of Physics and Chemistry, she and Pierre systematically processed tons of pitchblende to isolate first polonium (named for her homeland, July 1898) and then radium (December 1898). Both were new elements.

She completed her doctoral dissertation in 1903 — the first woman in France to earn a doctorate in physics. In December 1903, Marie, Pierre, and Henri Becquerel shared the Nobel Prize in Physics. Marie was the first woman to receive a Nobel Prize.

Pierre Curie was killed in April 1906 when he slipped and fell under a horse-drawn wagon on a Paris street. The University of Paris appointed Marie to his professorship at the Sorbonne — the first woman to hold a full professorship at the institution. She continued their shared research program and, in 1910, succeeded in isolating pure metallic radium.