In Honour of Marie Curie
Marie Curie, born Maria Sklodowska, is set to be honoured in Poland next year as parliament adopted a resolution to name 2011 the year of Marie Curie. Along with a scientific conference, a special tourist route will be created in Warsaw allowing visitors to learn more about Curie's many haunts across the city.
Polish-born Curie-Sklodowska was a pioneer in the field of radioactivity (she coined the term after all) and discovered two new elements - polonium (named after her native country) and radium.
The celebrations in 2011 will mark 100 years since Curie's receipt of two Nobel Prizes, for physics as well as chemistry, in 1911. She was the first woman to win a Nobel Prize and remains the only woman to have won the prize in two fields.
Recently, Time magazine also honoured Curie, including her in their list of the twenty-five most influential women of the 20th century.