[citation needed] It is a private non-profit foundation operating a research center on biophysics, cell biology and oncology and a hospital specialized in treatment of cancer.

Institut Curie is member of EU-LIFE, an alliance of leading life sciences research centres in Europe.

[2] Institut Curie does not offer undergraduate degrees, but awards PhDs and employs many postdoctoral students alongside its permanent staff.

The Foundation's purpose was to fund the Institut du Radium's activities and contribute to the development of its therapeutic component.

At the clinic, Regaud and his team developed innovative treatments combining surgery and radiation therapy to treat cancer.

If Economy - a social science - is excluded, 50% i.e 3 Nobel Prizes out of 6 received by French scientific women are affiliated to the Curie Institute.

Moreover, Curie mentored upwards of 45 scientific women from all over the world[6][7][8][9] including Marguerite Perey, discoverer of francium - five-time nominee for the Nobel Prize in Chemistry, and Jeanne Ferrier, discoverer of autoradiography, amongst many other peers: Sonia Cotelle, Harriet Brooks, Alice Leigh-Smith, Eva Ramstedt, Lucie Blanquies, Suzanne Veil, Catherine Chamié, Alicja Dorabialska, Ellen Gleditsch, Marthe Weiss, Antonia Elisabeth Korvezee, May Sybil Leslie, Ștefania Mărăcineanu, Branca Edmée Marques, Eliane Montel, Elizabeth Rona, Jadwiga Szmidt, Margarete von Wrangell, Renée Galabert, Isabelle Archinard, and last but not least, Curie's secretary of over 30 years: Léonie Razet.