Maria Skłodowska – Curie was born in Warsaw on 7th November 1867. Her father was a teacher. He taught Maths and Physics.

Maria Skłodowska Curie was an excellent student but she couldn’t study at University of Warsaw because she was a woman. She continued her education in Warsaw Floating University -informal classes held in secret.

In 1891 Maria Skłodowska Curie moved to Paris to get an offical degree. She studied at the Sorbonne in Paris. She got her master degree in Physics in 1893 and only a year later in Mathematics. She began to study on different types of steel and magnetic properties. She needed a lab. She met French physics Pierre Curie- her future husband. They got married in 1895 and she accepted French citizenship.

Maria Skłodowska Curie worked on uranium rays. She used the word radioactivity for the first time. Together with her husband they discovered a new radioactive element in 1898 -polonium (they named it after Maria’s native country - Poland). They also detected another radioactive element- radium.

In 1903 she received the Nobel Price in Physics together with her husband and Henri Becquerel for their work on radioactivity. In 1906 she became the first female professor and head of laboratory at the Sorbonne University.

In 1911 she won her second Nobel Price this time in chemistry for the discovery of radium and polonium. After the World War I she worked on X-rays.

Maria Skłodowska - Curie died in 1934. Her remains are in Pantheon in Paris - the final resting place of French greatest minds. She became the first and only women to rest there.

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