Who was the first woman to win two Nobel Prizes in two different categories?

Marie Curie's life was a struggle. She had to overcome countless obstacles to dedicate herself to science, given that in her home country, Poland, women were not allowed to attend university. She suffered hunger and cold, and risked her health to maintain her passion for research. Nevertheless, it can be said that she fulfilled her dream: she was the first woman to become a professor at the University of Paris and the first to win the Nobel Prize, shared with her husband Pierre Curie, for their research on radioactive elements.

In 1911, she won the Nobel Prize in Chemistry, this time alone, for the discovery of two new chemical elements: polonium and radium. Thus, Marie Curie also became the first person to win the coveted Nobel Prize twice. Besides Curie, only three men achieved such a feat: Linus Pauling, John Bardeen, and Frederick Sanger. Her daughter, Irène Joliot-Curie, won the Nobel Peace Prize in Chemistry in 1935, making them the only mother-daughter duo to have won this distinction.

As of the 2017 edition, the prize has been awarded 844 times to men, 49 times to women, and 24 times to organizations. Sixteen women have won the Nobel Peace Prize, fourteen for Literature, twelve for Physiology or Medicine, four for Chemistry, two for Physics, and only one for Economics. It is worth noting that 2009 was the year with the most women winners of the prize, with a total of five women awarded that year.