They were the first: Nobel Prize winners Marie Curie and Irène Joliot-Curie

This article aims to highlight the major milestones in the lives of two great women scientists who became icons for many women and girls empowering them in their search for a life path. A double Nobel Prize winner in two different fields (1903 and 1911) Marie Curie discovered new elements polonium and radium, isolated radium and studied its nature and compounds. Her daughter Irène Joliot-Curie, a 1935 Nobel Prize winner, synthesized new radioactive elements. Their scientific and civic activities expanded and deepened understanding of the physical world, made breakthroughs in medicine, and changed society’s ideas on the role of women. Keywords: artificial radioactive elements, Irène Joliot-Curie, Marie Curie, polonium, radium, the Nobel Prize, women – Nobel Prize winners, women-scientists