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ENGLISH ASSIGNMENT
ON
MARIE CURIE

K.DIVYA PRIYA
XII-SCIENCE
MARIE SALOMEA SKLODOSKA CURIE
(7 November 1867 – 4 July 1934)
CONTENT

1.INTRODUCTION

2. EARLY LIFE

3. LIFE IN PARIS

4. NEW ELEMENT

5. WORLD WAR 1

6. NOBLE PRICE

7. DEATH

8. HONOUR AND LEGACY

Marie Salomea Skłodowska Curie , born Maria Salomea Skłodowska( 7 November 1867 – 4
July 1934), was a Polish and naturalized-French physicist and chemist who conducted
pioneering research on radioactivity. As the first of the Curie family legacy of five Nobel Prizes,
she was the first woman to win a Nobel Prize, the first person and the only woman to win the
Nobel Prize twice, and the only person to win the Nobel Prize in two scientific fields. She was
the first woman to become a professor at the University of Paris in 1906.

She was born in Warsaw, in what was then the Kingdom of Poland, part of the Russian Empire.
She studied at Warsaw's clandestine Flying University and began her practical scientific training
in Warsaw. In 1891, aged 24, she followed her elder sister Bronisława to study in Paris, where
she earned her higher degrees and conducted her subsequent scientific work. In 1895 she
married the French physicist Pierre Curie, and she shared the 1903 Nobel Prize in Physics with
him and with the physicist Henri Becquerel for their pioneering work developing the theory of
"radioactivity"—a term she coined. In 1906 Pierre Curie died in a Paris street accident. Marie
won the 1911 Nobel Prize in Chemistry for her discovery of the elements polonium and radium,
using techniques she invented for isolating radioactive isotopes.

Under her direction, the world's first studies were conducted into the treatment of neoplasms
by the use of radioactive isotopes. In 1920 she founded the Curie Institute in Paris, and in 1932
the Curie Institute in Warsaw; both remain major centers of medical research. During World
War -I .she developed mobile radiography units to provide X-ray services to field hospitals.
While a French citizen, Marie Skłodowska Curie, who used both surnames, never lost her sense
of Polish identity. She taught her daughters the Polish language and took them on visits to
Poland. She named the first chemical element she discovered polonium, after her native
country.
EARLY LIFE

Maria Skłodowska was born in Warsaw, in Congress Poland in the Russian Empire, on 7
November 1867, the fifth and youngest child of well-known teachers Bronisława, née Boguska,
and Władysław Skłodowski. The elder siblings of Maria (nicknamed Mania) were Zofia (born
1862, nicknamed Zosia), Józef [pl] (born 1863, nicknamed Józio), Bronisława (born 1865,
nicknamed Bronia), and Helena (born 1866, nicknamed Hela).

On both the paternal and maternal sides, the family had lost their property and fortunes
through patriotic involvements in Polish national uprisings aimed at restoring Poland's
independence, had been principal of the Lublin primary school attended by Bolesław Prus, who
became a leading figure in Polish literature.
LIFE IN PARIS
In late 1891, she left Poland for France In Paris, Maria briefly
found shelter with her sister and brother-in-law before renting a
garret closer to the university, in the Latin Quarter, and
proceeding with her studies of physics, chemistry, and
mathematics at the University of Paris, where she enrolled in late
1891. She subsisted on her meagerhonorrecognizedhonor
resources, keeping herself warm during cold winters by wearing
all the clothes she had. She focused so hard on her studies that
she sometimes forgot to eat. Skłodowska studied during the day
and tutored evenings, barely earning her keep. In 1893, she was
awarded a degree in physics and began work in the industrial
laboratory of Gabriel Lippmann. Meanwhile, she continued studying at the University of Paris,
and with the aid of a fellowship, she was able to earn a second degree in 1894.

Skłodowska had begun her scientific career in Paris with an investigation of the magnetic
properties of various steels, commissioned by the Society for the Encouragement of National
Industry. That same year, Pierre Curie entered her life: it was their mutual interest in natural
sciences that drew them together. Pierre Curie was an instructor at The City of Paris Industrial
Physics and Chemistry Higher Educational Institution (ESPCI Paris). They were introduced by
Polish physicist Józef Wierusz-Kowalski, who had learned that she was looking for larger
laboratory space, something that Wierusz-Kowalski thought Pierre could access. Though Curie
did not have a large laboratory, he was able to find some space for Skłodowska where she was
able to begin work. Eventually, Pierre proposed marriage, but at first, Skłodowska did not accept
as she was still planning to go back to her native country. Curie, however, declared that he was
ready to move with her to Poland, even if it meant being reduced to teaching French. On 26 July
1895, they were married in Sceaux neither wanted a religious service. Curie's dark blue outfit,
worn instead of a bridal gown, would serve her for many years as a laboratory outfit. They
shared two pastimes: long bicycle trips and journeys abroad, which brought them even closer.
NEW ELEMENT

In 1895, Wilhelm Roentgen discovered the existence of X-rays, though the mechanism behind
their production was not yet understood. In 1896, Henri Becquerel discovered that uranium
salts emitted rays that resembled X-rays in their penetrating power. He demonstrated that this
radiation, unlike phosphorescence, did not depend on an external source of energy but seemed
to arise spontaneously from uranium itself. Influenced by these two important discoveries,
Curie decided to look into uranium rays as a possible field of research for a thesis. In July 1898,
Curie and her husband published a joint paper announcing the existence of an element they
named "polonium", in honour of her native Poland, which would for another twenty years
remain partitioned among three empires. On 26 December 1898, the Curies announced the
existence of a second element, which they named "radium", from the Latin word for "ray". In
the course of their research, they also coined the word "radioactivity".
NOBLE PRIZE

In December 1903 the Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences awarded Pierre Curie, Marie Curie,
and Henri Becquerel the Nobel Prize in Physics, "in recognition of the extraordinary services
they have rendered by their joint researches on the radiation phenomena discovered by
Professor Henri Becquerel. At first, the committee had intended to honour only Pierre Curie and
Henri Becquerel, but a committee member and advocate for women scientists, Swedish
mathematician Magnus Gösta Mittag-Leffler, alerted Pierre to the situation, and after his
complaint, Marie's name was added to the nomination. Marie Curie was the first woman to be
awarded a Nobel Prize

Nobel Prize in Physics (1903)

Nobel Prize in Chemistry (1911)

During World War I, Curie recognised that wounded soldiers were best served if operated upon
as soon as possible. She saw a need for field radiological centres near the front lines to assist
battlefield surgeons, including to obviate amputations when in fact limbs could be saved. After a
quick study of radiology, anatomy, and automotive mechanics she procured X-ray equipment,
vehicles, auxiliary generators, and developed mobile radiography units, which came to be
popularly known as petites Curies. She became the director of the Red Cross Radiology Service
and set up France's first military radiology center, operational by late 1914. Assisted at first by a
military doctor and her 17-year-old daughter Irène, Curie directed the installation of 20 mobile
radiological vehicles and another 200 radiological units at field hospitals in the first year of the
war Later, she began training other women as aides.
DEATH

Curie visited Poland for the last time in early 1934. A few months later, on 4 July 1934, she died
aged 66 at the Sancellemoz sanatorium in Passy, Haute-Savoie, from aplastic anemia believed to
have been contracted from her long-term radiation exposure, causing damage to her bone
marrow.

The damaging effects of ionizing radiation were not known at the time of her work, which had
been carried out without the safety measures later developed. She had carried test tubes
containing radioactive isotopes in her pocket and she stored them in her desk drawer,
remarking on the faint light that the substances gave off in the dark. Curie was also exposed to
X-rays from unshielded equipment while serving as a radiologist in field hospitals during the
war. When Curie's body was exhumed in 1995, the French Office de Protection Contre les
Rayonnements Ionisants (ORPI) "concluded that she could not have been exposed to lethal
levels of radium while she was alive". They pointed out that radium poses a risk only if it is
ingested and speculated that her illness was more likely to have been due to her use of
radiography during the First World War.
LEGACY

The physical and societal aspects of the Curies' work contributed to shaping the world of the
twentieth and twenty-first centuries. Cornell University professor L. Pearce Williams observes:
She was known for her honesty and moderate lifestyle. Having received a small scholarship in
1893, she returned it in 1897 as soon as she began earning her keep. She gave much of her first
Nobel Prize money to friends, family, students, and research associates. In an unusual decision,
Curie intentionally refrained from patenting the radium-isolation process so that the scientific
community could do research unhindered. She insisted that monetary gifts and awards be given
to the scientific institutions she was affiliated with rather than to her. She and her husband
often refused awards and medals.Albert Einstein reportedly remarked that she was probably
the only person who could not be corrupted by fame.
HONOURS AND TRIBUTES

As one of the most famous scientists, Marie Curie has become an icon in the scientific world
and has received tributes from across the globe, even in the realm of pop culture.

“Nothing in life is to be feared,

it is only to be understood.

Now is the time to understand more,

so that we may fear less.”