Issue date: 07 Feb, 2011
The General Assembly of the United Nations has proclaimed 2011 as International Year of Chemistry and philately joins in this celebration with a commemorative stamp. The IYC 2011 is an initiative of IUPAC, the International Union of Pure and Applied Chemistry, and of UNESCO. The goals of IYC2011 are to increase the public appreciation of chemistry in meeting world needs, to encourage interest in chemistry among young people, and to generate enthusiasm for the creative future of chemistry.
The year 2011 will coincide with the 100th anniversary of the Nobel Prize for Chemistry awarded to Madame Marie Curie and with the 100th anniversary of the founding of the International Association of Chemical Societies. Throughout the year there will be a wide range of interactive, entertaining, and educational activities under the unifying theme “Chemistry—our life, our future” emphasizing that chemistry is a creative science essential for sustainability and improvements to our way of life and how chemical research is critical for improving our every day life as it is involved in the production of food, health and a large number of manufactured goods.
The Nobel Prize in Chemistry Marie Curie, née Maria Sklodowska, was a Polish-born French scientist. The daughter of a distinguished professor, she was born in Warsaw in 1867 where she studied until the age of 24 when she moved to Paris to continue her studies at the Sorbonne. She obtained a degree in physics and mathematics and in 1895 she married French physicist Pierre Curie and became his most effective collaborator. A few years later she obtained her Phd with a thesis dedicated to radioactive substances. In 1898 in collaboration with her husband she discovered two new chemical elements: polonium, named in reference to her native country and radio.
In 1903 she was awarded the Nobel Prize in Physics shared with her husband and physicist Henri Becquerel for discovering radioactivity. After the death of her husband in 1906, she became professor of physics at the Sorbonne thus becoming the first woman who taught at the University of Paris. Author of several books and founder of the Radium Institute, in 1911 she received the Nobel Prize in Chemistry and the first person to receive this. distinction twice. Marie Curie died in 1934 near Salanches (France).
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