Poland Banknotes 20000 Zloty banknote 1988 Marie Sklodowska-Curie
National Bank of Poland - Narodowy Bank Polski
Polish People's Republic - Polska Rzeczpospolita Ludowa
Obverse: Portrait of Marie Sklodowska-Curie (1867 - 1934) physicist and chemist, co-founder of the science of radioactivity, twice winner of the Nobel Prize in 1903 with her husband Curie in Physics, in 1911 alone in the field of chemistry.
Reverse: First Polish nuclear reactor "Ewa" near Warsaw (dismantled in 1995).
Watermark: White Eagle - Coat of arms of Poland.
Signatures:
President of the National Bank of Poland - Zdzislaw Pakuła
Chief Treasurer of the National Bank of Poland - Zbigniew Marski
Issue Date: February 1, 1989
Dimension: 138 x 63 mm
Printer: PWPW - Polska Wytwórnia Papierów Wartościowych S.A. (Polish Security Printing Works, Warsaw, Poland)
Banknote design by Andrzej Heidrich, engraved by Wanda Zajdel.
In Circulation: from 26 February 1989 to 31 December 1996, bbanknote virtually withdrawn much earlier - by mid-1993 years - gradually reducing its circulation.
Poland banknotes - Poland paper money
1974-1993
2000 Zloty 5000 Zloty 10000 Zloty 20000 Zloty 50000 Zloty
100000 Zloty 200000 Zloty 500000 Zloty 1000000 Zloty 2000000 Zloty
Marie Sklodowska-Curie
Marie Sklodowska-Curie (7 November 1867 – 4 July 1934) was a Polish and naturalized-French physicist and chemist who conducted pioneering research on radioactivity. She was the first woman to win a Nobel Prize, the first person and only woman to win twice, the only person to win twice in multiple sciences, and was part of the Curie family legacy of five Nobel Prizes. She was also the first woman to become a professor at the University of Paris, and in 1995 became the first woman to be entombed on her own merits in the Panthéon in Paris.
She was born Maria Salomea Skłodowska in Warsaw, in what was then the Kingdom of Poland, part of the Russian Empire. She studied at Warsaw's clandestine Floating University and began her practical scientific training in Warsaw. In 1891, aged 24, she followed her older sister Bronisława to study in Paris, where she earned her higher degrees and conducted her subsequent scientific work. She shared the 1903 Nobel Prize in Physics with her husband Pierre Curie and with physicist Henri Becquerel. She won the 1911 Nobel Prize in Chemistry.
Her achievements included a theory of radioactivity (a term that she coined), techniques for isolating radioactive isotopes, and the discovery of two elements, polonium and radium. Under her direction, the world's first studies were conducted into the treatment of neoplasms, using radioactive isotopes. She founded the Curie Institutes in Paris and in Warsaw, which remain major centres of medical research today. During World War I, she established the first military field radiological centres.
While a French citizen, Marie Skłodowska Curie (she used both surnames) never lost her sense of Polish identity. She taught her daughters the Polish language and took them on visits to Poland. She named the first chemical element that she discovered – polonium, which she isolated in 1898 – after her native country.
Curie died in 1934 at the sanatorium of Sancellemoz (Haute-Savoie), France, due to aplastic anemia brought on by exposure to radiation – including carrying test tubes of radium in her pockets during research and her service during World War I in mobile X-ray units created by her.
First Polish nuclear reactor "Ewa" near Warsaw
The Ewa Reactor was Poland's first research nuclear reactor. Its name is derived from the first letters of the Polish words: Eksperymentalny (Experimental), Wodny (Water), and Atomowy (Atomic) as a reference to the Eve Curie.
It was activated on June 14, 1958, in the Instytut Badań Jądrowych (Institute of Nuclear Research) (Currently the Instytut Energii Atomowej [Atomic Energy Institute] ) in Otwock near Warsaw. It was deactivated it in February 1995 due to a shortage of uranium for experiments, and reactivated in April of the same year after the acquisition of new fuel. The reactor is currently deactivated and partially dismantled.
Ewa was based on the Soviet VVR-S design, had an initial power of 2 MW, was fueled by enriched uranium, and moderated by pressurized water. In 1963 and 1967, the reactor underwent two major overhauls that improved the safety of the reaction and allowed for the use of better enriched fuels. After these changes, the reactor's power increased first to 4 MW and ultimately to 10 MW. Its primary use was for producing radioactive isotopes. It functioned an average of 3500 hours a year.
Because of its design, the reactor is currently considered a potential site for the future site of storage of the spent fuel from the Maria Reactor.