Marie Curie

Curie is the only person to win Nobel Prizes in two different sciences — Physics in 1903 and Chemistry in 1911 — for her discovery of polonium and radium and her pioneering research into radioactivity, a term she coined. Her work fundamentally changed the understanding of the atom and opened the door to nuclear medicine, including X-ray machines she deployed in mobile field hospitals during World War I. She remains a towering figure who broke gender barriers at every institution she entered.