Marie Sklodowska Curie was a Polish physicist best know for her discovery of radioactivity and the radioactive elements radium and polonium. In 1898, Marie and Pierre Curie presented evidence for the discovery of an additional very active substance that behaved chemically almost like pure barium. They suggested the name of radium for the new element, and henceforth were identified with the discovery of radiation. For this the Curies were awarded the Nobel Prize in physics (1903), which they shared with Henri Becquerel, who was awarded half the price. In 1906, Marie was appointed as Professor of General Physics in the Faculty of Sciences at the Sorbonne, becoming the first female teacher in the institution’s 650-year history. She became the first person to win a second Nobel Prize (1911, in chemistry) for isolating radium and studying its chemical properties. This work revolutionized the understanding of the atom, previously thought to be the most fundamental particle, and laid the foundations for important breakthroughs in the application of radioactivity in medicine. She spent much of her life actively promoting the use of radiation for cancer therapy and traveled onto battlefield with X-Ray trucks saving soldiers lives by assisting doctors in finding shrapnel and bullets in soldiers.