Marie Curie was born on 7 November 1867. She was the first woman to win a Nobel Prize. She was also the first person to win two and she is still the only person to win Nobel Prizes in two different sciences (Physics and Chemistry). Her discoveries changed physics, chemistry, and medicine forever. They changed the world.

Today, on her birthday, we celebrate three things. Her extraordinary life, the humanist values that ran through it, and the women in science who are following in her footsteps today.

Who was Marie Curie?

Marie Curie was born Maria Skłodowska in Warsaw, at a time when Poland was under Russian rule and women were barred from going to university. Determined to learn, she studied in secret at the ‘Flying University’, an underground school that moved from house to house to avoid the authorities.

In 1891 she moved to Paris to study at the Sorbonne, where she earned degrees in physics and mathematics, often while living on very little money. There she met the physicist Pierre Curie. They married in 1895 in a simple civil ceremony, with no religious service, and began one of the most famous partnerships in the history of science.

Marie later wrote:

‘It was the simplest service possible, – a civil ceremony, for Pierre Curie professed no religion, and I myself did not practice any.’

Around the same time in the UK, the Ethical movement (the network of societies that Humanists UK grew out of) was starting to hold its own ‘ethical weddings’. One of the first was reported in 1898, three years after the Curies married. Those early ceremonies were the forerunners of today’s humanist weddings: deeply personal, non-religious ceremonies that celebrate a couple’s love, values and story.

What did Marie Curie discover?

Marie Curie coined the word ‘radioactivity’ and spent her life investigating it. In 1898, she and Pierre discovered two new elements. She named the first polonium, after her homeland, Poland, and the second radium.

In 1903, the Curies shared the Nobel Prize in Physics with Henri Becquerel for their work on radioactivity. In 1911, Marie won a second Nobel Prize, this time in Chemistry, for discovering polonium and radium. Their work laid the foundations for radiotherapy, the use of radiation to treat cancer, which still saves lives every day.

When the First World War began, she put her science straight to practical use. She helped equip mobile X-ray units, nicknamed ‘petites Curies’ (‘little Curies’), so that surgeons near the front line could find bullets and shrapnel in wounded soldiers. She even learned to drive so she could take them out herself.

When and how did Marie Curie die?

Marie Curie died on 4 July 1934, aged 66, from aplastic anaemia – a condition probably caused by her years of exposure to radiation, at a time when its dangers were not understood. Her notebooks are still so radioactive that they are kept in lead-lined boxes.

In 1995, her remains were moved to the Panthéon in Paris, where France honours its greatest citizens. She was the first woman to be buried there for her own achievements.

Marie Curie and humanism

Marie Curie was raised a Roman Catholic, but became non-religious as a teenager after the deaths of her mother and her sister, and lived the rest of her life as an agnostic. Her outlook was grounded in reason and evidence, and in a deep belief that knowledge should be used to make human lives better.

Her belief that science should benefit everyone shows in how she lived. The Curies chose not to patent their method for isolating radium, so that scientists everywhere could use it. Marie used her fame to raise money for research rather than for herself. And she approached the unknown with curiosity rather than fear. As she put it:

That could be a motto for the humanist approach to life: trust reason and the scientific method to understand the world, and use that understanding for the good of everyone. You can explore these ideas further in our free Understanding the World resources on Understanding Humanism, our education website. You can also read more about Marie and Pierre Curie on our main website.

Why women in science matter to the humanist movement

Women scientists have been at the heart of the humanist story – often while having to fight far harder than men for recognition.

One of the most famous is the humanist Rosalind Franklin, whose X-ray images were key to discovering the structure of DNA. She once wrote to her father that she did not accept the idea that faith meant ‘belief in life after death’. You can read more about Rosalind Franklin on Humanist Heritage.

Every year, we celebrate her legacy with our Rosalind Franklin Lecture, held around International Women’s Day, to celebrate the contributions of women in science. Recent lectures have been given by Claudia Hammond on the science of kindness, Dr Emma Byrne on the amazing science of bad language, and Dr Hannah Critchlow on the science of fate.

.huk-heritage-cards__image img{object-fit:cover;width:100%;height:100%}

Today, many women who champion science in public life are patrons of Humanists UK, lending their public support to our work. They include Professor Alice Roberts, Dr Helen Czerski, Dr Hannah Critchlow, Dr Rebecca Wragg Sykes, Professor Anjali Goswami, Dr Susan Blackmore, Professor Kate Devlin, and Dr Emma Byrne.

And yet too many women scientists remain far less well known than they should be. Rosalind Franklin is the only woman among the 86 scientists named in GCSE and National 5 science specifications across the UK, according to new research from the University of Cambridge. Marie Curie isn’t named at all, and the researchers recommend adding her. Telling their stories matters. When young people can see women like Marie Curie and Rosalind Franklin as part of the story of science, more of them can imagine themselves writing the next chapter.

Source link