Irene Joliet-Curie
Personal Information
Born: 1897
Died: 1956
Country of Birth: France
Nationality: France
Ethnicity: White
Education
College Sevigne Baccalaureat 1914; University of Paris-Sorbonne BA 1916 & 1918 Mathematics & Physics, PhD Physics 1925 (research conducted at Institute du Radium)
Professional Life
Field of Study: Chemistry, Physics
Institution/Corporation: Institute du Radium, Paris, France
Degrees & Memberships: Member: Comite National de l Union des Femmes Francais; World Peace Council; Officer of the Legion of Honour (1939); French Alternative Energies & Atomic Energy Commission (CEA, 1945)
Awards & Achievements
Awards: 1935, Nobel Prize in Chemistry (with husband Frederic Joliot-Curie); 1940, Barnard College Gold Medal for Meritorious Service to Science (with Frederic); 1932, Matteucci Medal, Italian Society for Sciences; 1933, Henri Wilde Prize; 1934, Marquet Prize, Academy of Sciences
Achievements: 1936, appointed Undersecretary of State for Scientific Research; worked with her mother, Marie, to provide mobile x-ray units during WWII & taught doctors & nurses how to use them to find shrapnel in soildiers; 1946, appointed director of Institute du Radium (school founded by her mother)
1935, won Nobel Prize in Chemistry with her husband Frederick, the 2nd married couple (after her parents) recipients
She & Frederick took great pains to seal & hide their research to keep it out of the hands of the Nazis
Was active in women's rights groups
One of the 1st 3 female members of the French government
Her mother & several of her scholar friends formed "The Cooperative" to privately home school their children for 2 years
Worked as a nurse radiographer alongside her mother during WWI; taught doctors how to locate shrapnel in bodies using radiography
Contracted TB during WWII
died at age 58 from leukemia likely due to exposure to polonium-210