The Women Who Shaped Today's Science: Marie Curie

 March 15, 2023

Ashlyn Tsang, Maya Puterman, Noa Essner

10th Grade

Marie Curie was a French scientist who worked alongside her husband, Pierre Curie. Together, they both won two Nobel Prizes and discovered radioactivity. Maria Sklodowska was her birth name, and she was the youngest of five in her family. She was born on November 7, 1867, in Warsaw, Poland. As both her parents were teachers, Marie was able to read and write very early on. She was known to be an excellent student with a remarkable memory. 

During the time Marie grew up, Poland was controlled by Russia, and reading or writing in Polish came to be forbidden, restricting Curie from the opportunity to learn and grow. Due to the Russian invasion, Marie’s father lost his job. By the time Marie was ten, her sister had passed away from Typhus. Two years after that, her mother died from tuberculosis. Marie graduated from high school and went to University. However, University was not encouraged for women during that time. She attended a University in Paris called Sorbonne, which only women could attend. She read about math and physics and wanted to become a scientist. She then earned her Physics degree after three years. Marie met Pierre Curie in 1894, who was also a scientist. 

Curie began her interest in rays after it was discovered by Wilhelm Roentgen and Henri Becquerel, who were also scientists. Becquerel had found rays that were emitted from an element called uranium. Marie started her own experiments, one of them was examining a supply called pitchblende. Based on Becquerel’s discovery, Marie expected rays to be emitted from uranium in pitchblende, but instead, she found many rays. She then understood that there was a new element that was not yet discovered. Marie and her husband spent time investigating pitchblende, trying to identify this new element. Eventually, they found that there were two discovered elements, which now can be found on the periodic table. Marie named polonium after Poland, which was her native land, and named the other element radium, as it gave off powerful rays. 

Marie and her husband developed the word “radioactivity” to describe elements that gave off powerful rays. Marie became the first woman to win a Nobel Prize in 1903, the Nobel Award for Physics, with Pierre Curie and Henri Becquerel for their research in radioactivity. In 1911, Marie won the Nobel Award for Chemistry, making her the only woman to have won two Nobel Prize awards. She became well known, and doctors eventually realized that radiology could help with curing cancer. Marie realized that X-ray machines could be used by doctors to analyze any soldier's injuries during World War I. Unfortunately, not every hospital could have an X-ray machine, as there was not enough supply to meet the demand. Marie developed the idea of transporting the machines to different hospitals in a truck, making them portable. These trucks became known as “Little Curies” and helped over 1 million people during the war. 

On July 4, 1934, Marie Curie died from overexposure to radiation. This was a result of her radioactive experiments and working with the X-ray machine. Marie’s invention of the X-ray machine is still used today. Her discovery of radium and polonium were significant as they were radioactive elements, meaning that they can conduct electricity through invisible rays when their atoms break down. Her work on radiation is still being developed and studied by scientists all over the world.