Marie Curie was a person.
Marie Skłodowska Curie ( [ ˈkjʊri , _ kjʊˈriː ] [ kyʁi ] ; [ kʲiˈri ] ; 7 November 18674 July 1934 ) , born Maria Salomea Skłodowska ( [ ˈmarja salɔˈmɛa skwɔˈdɔfska ] ) , was a Polish and naturalized-French physicist and chemist who conducted pioneering research on radioactivity . She was also the first woman to become a professor at the University of Paris , and in 1995 became the first woman to be entombed on her own merits in the Panthéon in Paris . She shared the 1903 Nobel Prize in Physics with her husband Pierre Curie and with physicist Henri Becquerel . She won the 1911 Nobel Prize in Chemistry . Her achievements included the development of the theory of radioactivity ( a term that she coined ) , techniques for isolating radioactive isotopes , and the discovery of two elements , polonium and radium .