2011 marks the centenary year of the second Nobel Prize awarded to Marie Curie. It is also the UNESCO Year of Chemistry, which recognizes the important role Marie Curie played in the advancement of science. Three young chemists whose work is presented here represent some of the countless researchers inspired by the renowned Polish scientist. As 3 of the more than 25,000 researchers who have been supported by the European Union's "Marie Curie Actions" since their inception in 1996, they represent a large body of researchers for whom international borders are no obstacle to a successful research career. The three chemists are also crossing disciplinary borders: all are working in the field of protein chemistry uniting biology, chemistry, and physics. One researcher is investigating flow-aligned polarized Raman spectroscopy, which allows for better data on structure, orientation, and interactions of biomacromolecules in their native environments. Another chemist is examining protein interactions to gain insight in the stability of soft matter systems, in their structural and dynamical properties, and in their (biological) function, in particular, cluster, glass, and crystal formation in concentrated protein mixtures of opposite charge. The third researcher is synthesizing and demonstrating one of the first synthetic molecular machines capable of mimicking translation, the process through which protein is synthesized on the mRNA template in the ribosome.