In their laboratory in France, Marie Curie and her husband, Pierre Curie,
isolated two new elements that caused most of the radioactivity of the
uranium mineral. They named one radium because it gave off powerful, invisible
rays, and the other polonium in honor of Madame Curie's country of birth.
Marie Curie was the first scientist ever to win the Nobel prize in two
different fields--in physics, shared with her husband, and later in chemistry.
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Nature of Science (grades 9-12): Historical Perspectives.
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