 Three women have won the Nobel Prize in Physics, awarded annually since 1901 by the Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences.Marie Curie was the first woman to receive the prize in 1903, along with Pierre Curie and Henri Becquerel - making her the only woman to be awarded two Nobel prizes (her second Nobel prize was in Chemistry in 1911).Maria Goeppert Mayer became the second woman to win the prize in 1963, for her contributions to understanding the nuclear shell structure.