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Physicists Marie and Pierre (centre) Curie (1867-1934 and 1859-1906)in the laboratory where they discovered the radioactive elements radium and polonium. This laboratory is seen c. 1900 and was situated on Rue l'Homond in Paris, France. Coinciding with the work of Rutherford and Becquerel, the Curie's work on radioactivity helped to show there were three different types of radioactivity: alpha, beta and gamma. In 1903 they jointly won the Nobel Prize for physics for their studies in radioactive radiations. In 1911, Marie won the Nobel Prize for the second time, in chemistry, for the discovery of two new elements, radium and polonium. (KEYSTONE/SCIENCE PHOTO LIBRARY/WELLCOME IMAGES/SCIENCE PHOTO LIBRARY)