Women in STEM

Tapputi-Belatekallim

1200 BCE

Tapputi was a royal Babylonian perfume-maker and is often recognized as being the first chemist. Record of her work was inscribed in cuneiform tablet from 1200 BCE. At the time, perfumes served medicinal and religious purposes in addition to cosmetics. Tapputi is credited with being the official overseer of perfumery in the royal palace. Justin Blake

Gārgī Vāchaknavī

800 BCE

Born the daughter of a sage, Gārgī rose to renown as a natural philosopher. She questioned the nature of the natural world at a time when the practice was seen as novel, becoming widely respected in her time. She is best know for her debate against Yajnavalkya, considered the wisest sage at the time. Among several sages and philosophers that rose to debate him, Gārgī was the only one who could keep pace with him, eventually forcing him to cut off the dialogue to save face. Charles Begle.

Pythias

362 BCE

Pythias the Elder was an botanist and embryologist who lived in ancient Greece. She was married to Aristotle, and it is said the two of them compiled an encyclopedia on living things -JZ

Artemisia II of Caria

351 BCE

Artemisia II, Queen of Caria, married to her brother King Mausolus. She took over his reign for three years after his death. At this time she commanded a fleet of ships and was very active in military-politics. She is know for building one of the Seven Wonders of the World, the Mausoleum, as a tomb for her husband. She was a botanist and medical researcher. A genus of plants are named after her, Artemisia. She discovered healing properties in the plant parthenis (later renamed after her). -- AWC

Agnodice

300 BCE

Agnodice was born in 300 BCE. She is often considered the first female midwife or physician. She practiced in Greece at a time when women were not allowed to be midwives. She disguised herself as a man to apprentice under a famous physician at the time Herophilus. Her skill and ability to comfort female patients made her highly requested as a midwife. She was then accused of corruption and revealed her sex to the courts. Afterwards, free-born women were allowed to become midwives. -- Alec Carter

Fang

100 BCE

Very little is known about her, as we only have writings of her from another alchemist in her time, Ko Hung. Fang, her family name and all she was known by, was one of the first notable alchemists. She had discovered a way to use mercury with silver ore to leave behind pure silver, a method still used today. Unfortunately, her husband tried to abuse her secret out of her. She went mad (possibly from mercury poisoning), and took her secret to the grave at the time. - Connie M

Mary the Jewess

76

Also known as Mary the Prophetess, she is known as an extremely early alchemist and is referenced in the Zosimos of Panopolis, who was one of the first alchemical writers, as "one of the sages". She likely lived sometime between the 1st and 3rd centuries, and some of the concepts she is referenced for are still in practice today, specifically the bain-marie, or Mary's bath, which works in the same concept as a double boiler and is used to heat things gently. JO

Metrodora

200

Metrodora was an Egyptian gynecologist and midwife who is thought to have been born between 200-400 AD. Despite Egypt having fewer barriers for women compared to other places, there were still barriers for women that Metrodora had to overcome to attain her education. Metrodora published several gynecological papers and invented something similar to the tampon as a contraceptive and treatment to cure menstrual infections.
Link text
-DC

Hypatia

370

A Greek pagan, neoplatonist philosopher, astronomer, and mathematician. Lived in Alexandria, Egypt. Born 350-370 ad and died in 415 ad, she is the first female mathematician who's life was well recorded. She became a martyr for philosophy after angry mob led by a church lector named Peter after a rumor was spread that she was preventing the Prefect Orestes from reconciling after a feud with Cyril the bishop of Alexandria. She later became a symbol of Christian values strangely
-Molly Kohli

Keng Hsien-Seng

975

Keng (a.k.a. Master Geng) was a Chinese alchemist and perfume maker employed by the Imperial Court. She was recognized for her technique of extracting silver from ore using mercury. She was also known to use an early form of the Soxhlet process which could extract alcohol from camphor. Keng was described as being acquainted with Taoist techniques (a school of philosophical thought of Chinese origin) and scientific writing of the time noted her ability to control the spirits.

Lubna of Córdoba

984

Lubna of Córdoba (? - 984) was born a Spanish slave, but she rose to become the secretary to the Caliph of Córdoba. She studied calculus and mathematics, but is most well remembered for her work in creating and maintaining the Medina Azahara, a library in Córdoba that housed over half a million books, many of which were collected on Lubna's travels or translated by her. There are also some stories that she taught math equations to children that chased after her, and they came back for more.JO

Sutaata al-Mahamili

987

Sutaata al-Mahamili (? - 987) was a mathematician born in Bagdad. She solved algebraic problems (new at the time) and made original contributions to the field. She created general solutions for types of problems, and other mathematicians used her work when solving their own problems. There isn't much information on her, but she appears to be a highly respected mathematician.
-Marley Dota-Clemens

Anna Comnena

1083

A Byzantine princess from the 10th century. She is most well known for writing the Alexiad, a record of her father Alexios I Komnenos' reign as the emperor of the Byzantine and some time after his death. She was noted to be a very intelligent person with a great knowledge of sciences and philosophy. Anna ran a hospital and orphanage that was said to have over 10,000 beds for the sick. Anna also became an expert on gout to help her father as he suffered from the disease later in his life.
HYD

Agatha Streicher

1520

Agatha Streicher was the first women physician in Germany. Streicher was not allowed to study medicine at any universities because she was a woman, but she studied at home with the help of her brother who was medical doctor. She was allowed to take the Hippocratic Oath in 1561 and started a private practice. She was known for her remedy for bladder stones and was able to help Emperor Maximilian II who had gout and was able to take away his suffering in his days before death.

Sophia Brahe

Sep 22, 1556

(1556-1643)Sister of astronomer Tycho and in her own right practiced astronomy, chemistry, horticulture, and medicine. The siblings were condemned by their family for practicing science (which nobility ought not to do). She assisted Tycho with his observations which became essential to understanding planetary orbits. She furthered her study of astronomy using German and Latin books and soon became self taught. Her final works involved the documentation of generations of Danish noble families. JN

Marie de Brimeu

1593

Born in 1550, Marie de Brimeu was a Flemish botanist and horticulturist and a noblewoman. She was a member of the scientific circle of Carlos Clusius. Marie was Carlos's lifelong friend despite their different social statuses and their letters to each other help us know the knowledge of botany at the time. She became an expert in horticulture and creating gardens well known through southern and northern Netherlands.
She became a professor in 1593 and worked with many women regardless of religion

Maria Sibylla Merian

1647

Merian was a botanist who drew incredibly detailed and precise drawings of insects and plants. I found Merian interesting because of our class discussion! The meeting with Alyse Bensel broadened my viewpoint on the relationship between women, science, and art. One interesting fact about her is she was the first scientist to watch and describe not only insect life cycles but also how the organisms interacted with their environments. (www.livescience.com/amazing-women-in-math-and-science.html) SG

Catherine Jérémie

Sep 22, 1664

A midwife and botanist from the Canadian colony of New France. She is credited as one of the earliest botanists in Canada and the first known female naturalist. In 1702, she moved to Montreal with her second husband Michel LePailleur. There she began her studies and research in botany and midwifery. She studied the indigenous population’s medicinal practices. She applied these findings along with her own discoveries to women’s bodily experiences (childbirth, abortion, and pregnancy).

Anna Morandi Manzolini

1714

Morandi (1714-1774) was an 18th-century anatomist and artist, famous for her anatomical wax models. She taught alongside her husband at the University of Bologna, and the pair often used their house as a lab and teaching space. Morandi’s speciality was isolating organs for dissection, and she focused on sensory organs and the male reproductive system. Morandi recorded her scientific work in her Anatomical Notebooks. She also created a self-portrait wax model. Link text

Anna Morandi Manzolini

1714

"As an anatomist, Morandi went where no woman had gone before, helping to usher in a new understanding of the male body and developing new techniques for examining organs..Yet in one way, she was no exception to what has become a common narrative of historical women in science: Despite her achievement and acclaim during her lifetime, her role was ultimately written out of history" Lynette Santos
https://www.smithsonianmag.com/science-nature/lady-anatomist-who-brought-dead-bodies-light-180964165/

Marie-Anne Paulze Lavoisier

1758

Marie-Anne Paulze Lavoisier (1758 - 1836) was a chemist who worked with her husband, Antoine on the study of chemistry and eventually helped to revolutionize the field. She worked with him in the lab in their home, as well as translating both their own and foreign works in the field to keep up with others in the field and study their hypothesizes. JO

Sophie Germain

1776

Sophie Germain (1776-1831) was a French mathematician. She attended a prestigious math university, École Polytechnique, which was very hard for women to get into at the time. In order to be taken seriously by her professors, she would send letters of her math theorems under a fake male name. She is best known for creating the linear elasticity theorem. Because of this, she was honored by the Paris Academy of Sciences. Link text
-Dita

Mary Somerville

Dec 26, 1780

Mary Somerville became interested in mathematical equations in a fashion magazine for women, and began studying algebra against her father’s wishes. After the death of her first husband, she began associating with others in intellectual circles. She remarried a man that supported her interest in the sciences, and wrote and translated scientific writings. Somerville was one of the first two women to become “honorary” members of the Royal Astronomical Society.
- Blair

Caroline Herschel

1787

She was the first woman to discover a comet. She and her brother William Hershel discovered around 2,500 new star clusters and nebulae. She was the first woman to get paid for her scientific studies when King George III recognized her in 1787 as William’s assistant. In 1838, she was awarded a gold medal from the royal astronomical society. She discovered a total of 14 nebulas, 8 comets, and added 561 new stars to the flamsteeds atlas. (BD)

Mary Anning

1799

Mary Anning was born in 1799 in Lyme Regis, England. She is considered the first female paleontologist. Her biggest achievement was unearthing the first complete plesiosaur. She also found a fossil linking sharks and rays, among other things. She had achieved most of her important discoveries before she was 13. Although she was an immensely successful paleontologist she didn’t get a lot of the credit she deserved until after her death. She passed away in 1847 from breast cancer. -Kaitlyn K

Janet Taylor

May 12, 1804

Janet, born 'Jane Ann lonn,' was an English astronomer and navigation expert, as well as a mathematician and meteorologist.
She wrote two books on nautical navigation, created a nautical academy, and created instruments for nautical navigation. Because the field was so male dominated at the time, she'd refer to herself as male in her books, as to keep her perceived credibility. (Added by Gavin Hehir)

Ada Lovelace

1815

Ada Lovelace (1815-1852) was a mathematician in the 19th century who is most well known for her study of Charles Babbage's Analytical Engine. How she understood and described this engine credit her with the creation of the first computer algorithm using this engine. Her contributions to the Analytical Engine are still being argued today between different biographers. JO

Eunice Foote

Jul 17, 1819

Eunice Foote (1819-1888) was an American scientist and women's rights activist who discovered the greenhouse effect. The experiment was done by measuring the temperature of jars filled with gasses that had been set in the sun, which showed higher temperatures in wet air, and the highest in CO2. In her writing she concluded that such gasses could contribute to global warming. Her findings were overlooked (John Tyndall was previously credited) until her writing was discovered in 2011. JN

Elizabeth Blackwell

Feb 3, 1821

Elizabeth Blackwell was an important figure of her time. She was the first woman to receive a medical degree in the United States. Born in Bristol, England, she later moved to Cincinnati, Ohio. At the time, women were not allowed to be trained as apprentices to become doctors. At the time, America had few medical colleges; a majority of which excluded women. Geneva College accepted her application. She was one of the first pioneers of preventative care and personal hygiene. HS

Sofya Kovalevskaya

1850

Sofya Kovalevskaya (1850-1891) was a Russian mathematician who was one of the first women in the world to obtain a doctorate in mathematics and one of the first women to be in a full professorship in northern Europe. She was also one of the first to work as an editor in a scientific journal. She contributed mostly in the fields of partial differentials, analysis, and mechanics.
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- Dita

Mary J. Rathbun

Jun 11, 1860

Rathbun was a carcinologist who specialized in taxonomy. She worked as a volunteer assistant at a Marine Research Center, classifying and labelling crab specimens, and in 1886 she transferred to the Division of Marine Invertebrates at the Smithsonian. Rathbun described over 1000 species and helped establish the taxonomic nomenclature for decapod crustaceans. She published 158 scientific articles on crustacea, and her records are still used at the Smithsonian by researchers.

Marie Curie

1867

Marie Curie was a Polish-French physicist and chemist, as well as the first woman to win a Nobel Prize. She was born in 1867 in Poland and studied in Warsaw, before moving to Paris for further study. She coined the term “radioactivity” and made many related discoveries, including some with her husband, Pierre Curie. She was also the first to isolate the elements radium and polonium, and contributed to X-ray technology. She died in 1934, most likely from exposure to radiation. Elisa R.

Henrietta Swan Leavitt

1868

Leavitt (1868-1921) was a deaf, American astronomer who worked at a lab in Harvard and later became the head of the their observatory photometry department. She identified the correlation between the brightness of stars and their distance from the earth which then inspired other discoveries in astronomy such as the idea that the universe is expanding. She also identified over 2,000 variable stars and 4 novas. Link text
-Dita

Margaret E. Knight

1870

"It’s natural to think about the processes that produced the food in your daily sack lunch, but have you ever stopped to consider the manufacturing techniques behind the sack itself? The flat-bottomed brown paper bags we encounter constantly—in the lunch context, at grocery stores, in gift shops—are as unassuming as they are ubiquitous..."
-Lynette Santos
https://www.smithsonianmag.com/smithsonian-institution/meet-female-inventor-behind-mass-market-paper-bags-180968469/

Ynes Mexia

May 24, 1870

Ynes Mexia (1870-1938) was a botanist and plant collector. She mainly worked in collecting and categorizing plants, but was also a conservationist, mainly for the redwood forests in Northern California. While she is most known for this work, she did not go back to school for botany until age 51. She also has many plants named after her, the first being Mimosa Mexiae. Link text - Jay

Dr. Beatrice Edgell

Oct 26, 1871

Beatrice Edgell was the first British woman to receive a phd in psychology and the first British woman to be named a professor of psychology. She started as a lecturer of philosophy at Bedford College, and was working there as the head of the department of mental and moral science, which became the department of philosophy and psychology in 1906. In 1927 Edgell was named a professor of psychology by the University of London, the first feale professor of psychology in Britain.
HYD

Florence Rena Sabin

Nov 9, 1871

Born in Central City, Colorado Sabin would attend the John Hopkins School of Medicine as one of only fourteen women in her class. After graduating Sabin would become the first woman to become a full professor at a medical college by being appointed as the professor of embryology and histology. Sabin would conduct research into a number of subjects related to blood and blood dieseases. Sabin was also the first woman elected as president of the American Association of Atanomists.
David Benson

Mary Engle Pennington

Oct 8, 1872

Born in Nashville Tennessee, Dr. Mary Engle Pennington pioneered the evolution of safe and sanitary methods of storing and shipping perishable goods. In 1892 Pennington was denied a bachelor's degree from the University of Pennsylvania and instead was received a certificate of proficiency in chemistry. Pennington would join the U.S. Department of Agriculture in 1905 and became Chief of its Food Research Lab in 1908.
David Benson

Lillian Gilbreth

1878

Lillian Gilbreth (1878-1972) was considered the first industrial/organizational psychologist. She worked with her husband to maximize efficiency in scientific management, pioneering the fields of ergonomics and human factors. Her study combined soft sciences like psychology and anthropometrics with engineering and industry.
-Elisa R

Frances Glessner Lee

Mar 28, 1878

Noted as "the only woman to have ever made a major contribution to the field of forensic science," Lee combined her knowledge of medicine and craftwork to earn herself the title "The Mother of Forensic Science." She created 19 dioramas which she called the Nutshell Studies of Unexplained Death, depicting various miniature crime scenes in extreme detail. She used these in her lectures on crime scene forensics that she gave to police officers in 1945.

Emmy Noether

1882

Emmy Noether is, according to Albert Einstein, as the most important woman in the field of mathematics. She was born in a Jewish family in Germany, she taught there until the Nazis forced jewish teachers to move - and she came to America. She focused on abstract algebra and often let others take partial or total credit for discoveries to improve their own careers - as university refused to pay her for a while and only little later.

Edith Clark

1883

From studying math and astronomy in 1908 at Vassar College, to teaching mathematics in San Francisco and West Virginia, to being a civil engineering student at University of Wisconsin. Clark was the first woman to be employed as an electrical engineer in the US at General Electric, and invented a graphical calculator for power line management.

• JZ

Imogen Cunningham

Apr 12, 1883

Cunningham (1883-1976) was a photographer in the early 1900s that was known for her work in botanical photography. In 1933, Cunningham founded the California Horticultural Society in which her images were so detailed and clear that many horticulturalist and scientists used her images in their studies. (Submitted by Gavin Hehir.)

Karen Horney

Sep 16, 1885

A psychoanalyst from the late 1800s, Karen Horney worked with Alfred Alder on developing Neo-Freudianism, a development and critique of many of Freud's key beliefs. The biggest difference between the two ideologies being the views on how personality is formed and how the sexes develop differently. Horney was very much against the Freudian concept of "penis envy", believing that Freud had misconstrued women's jealousy of men's power in society with a much more physical jealousy.
HYD

Marie Curie

Nov 7, 1887

Marie Curie was a physicist and chemist who pioneered research in radioactivity. Her analysis of different elements leads to the discovery of polonium and radium. She won the Nobel peace prize in chemistry for her discoveries with radioactivity. A highly decorated scientist, she was the first woman to be awarded the Nobel Prize and is one of the only women to win the Nobel prize twice. HS

Dr. Susan La Flesche Picotte

1889

Born in 1865 on the Omaha reservation, Susan La Flesche Picotte was the first Native American woman to receive a medical decree. Her drive came from the fact that, as a child, she watched Native women die because the white doctor would not treat them. She graduated from the Women's Medical College of PA at 24 and then cared for ~1200 Omaha people. She eventually served white people as well at her private practice in Bancroft. Before she died, she opened a hospital in Walthill, Nebraska.-Connie M

Elizebeth Friedman

Aug 26, 1892

Elizebeth Friedman (1892-1980) worked as America’s first female cryptanalyst in WW1, prohibition, and WW2. She began her career as a linguist from Indiana and created methods along with her husband William for early codebreaking. She began teaching and practicing cryptanalysis during WW1, and was later hired by the U.S. government to eradicate alcohol rings during prohibition. In WW2, she helped dissipate a Nazi spy ring in South America.
- Solomon

Jannaki Ammal

1897

India's first female plant scientist, who studied at University of Michigan and joined the Royal Horticultural Society as a cytologist. She was invited to reorganize the Botanical Service of India. Her studies of plant chromosomes shed insight on botanical evolution and genetic modification
- JZ

Katharine Burr Blodgett

Jan 10, 1898

Katharine Burr Blodgett was a physicist and chemist who would go on to create nonreflective glass while being an employee at General Electric. The first woman to work as a scientist for General Electric Laboratory, she developed a tool to create non-reflective glass that we use often today. She helped improve the lightbulb's design, which lead way for plasma physics to become a scientific field. Her work in science lead to large discoveries in science and became a well-respected scientist. HS

Barbara McClintock

Jun 16, 1902

Barbara McClintock was a cytogeneticist studying maize in the 1950s. Her scientific discoveries were advanced for her time, causing other scientists to ignore or harshly criticize her findings for over a decade. Her largest discovery was genetic transposition or “jumping genes”. Eventually, her work was confirmed and she was awarded the Nobel Prize in 1983. She is also considered to have been autistic, seen through her extreme fixation in her studies.
- Blair

Maria Goeppert Mayer

1906

Maria Goeppert Mayer (1906-1972) was a theoretical physicist who became the second-ever woman to win the Nobel Peace Prize in physics. Her work consisted of studying the separation of uranium isotopes for the atomic bomb project. She later did research at the University of Chicago on the architecture of nuclei. One interesting fact is by the age of 24, Mayer had earned her doctorate in theoretical physics. -SG Link Text

Grace Hopper

1906

Hopper(1906-1992) was primarily a computer programmer but she received her master’s and Ph.D in mathematics from Yale. In 1943 she joined the US Naval Reserve and worked on top-secret operations like calibrating minesweepers, calculating the range on aircraft guns, and checking the math behind the creation of the Plutonium Bomb. She is the source of most jargon in computing these days, for example, she coined the term computer bug when she found a dead moth in a computer making it malfunction BD

Rachel Carson

May 27, 1907

Rachel Carson was born in 1907. She was a scientist and ecologist, and writer. She was hired as a radio script writer, and went on to write about nature and its history. She is most famous for her book Silent Spring. The book discusses the use of harmful pesticides and how humanity is vital to the survival of the planet. Carson died in 1964 due to breast cancer but her work is still incredibly influential to this day, especially around circles discussing agriculture and climate change. Kaitlyn K

Edith Clarke

1908

Orphaned at the age of 12, Clarke used her inheritence to fund her passion for mathematics. She was the first American woman to work as a recognised electrical engineer, and later the first female proffessor in the field. In her professional career, she wrote an influential textbook called Circuit Analysis of A-C Power Systems, developed one of the earliest graphing calculator, and contributing to the West Hoover Dam. She was inducted into the National Inventors Hall of Fame in 2015. - Charles B

Dorothy Mary Crowfoot Hodgkin

May 12, 1910

Dorothy Mary Crowfoot Hodgkin (1910-1994) was a Nobel Prize winning chemist who's studies revolved around finding the 3 Dimensional structures of molecules. Some of her important discoveries included the structures of penicillin, Vitamin B12, and most of all, insulin. She did all of this while having deformities in her hands and feet, as well as being diagnosed with rheumatoid arthritis. In her later life she remained scientifically active even while in a wheelchair. Submitted by Gavin Hehir

Dr. Chien-Shung Wu

1912

Dr. Wu (1912 - 1997) was a physicist who was born in China, who would receive her PH.D from University of California, Berkeley eventually join the Manhattan Project in 1944. There, she made contributions in improving geiger counters and uranium processing. After the war, she confirmed Fermi's theory of beta decay, as well as designed an experiment proving that the conservation of parity did not apply to beta decay. This experiment would be known as the Wu Experiment.
- JZ

Sister Mary Kenneth Keller

Dec 17, 1913

Mary Kenneth Keller (1913-1985) was an American Roman Catholic and was the first person along with Irving C. Tang to receive a Ph.D in computer science. She helped develop the computer language BASIC, and broke the "men only rule" at Dartmouth so she could use their computer labs. (Added by Gavin Hehir)

Hedy Lamarr

1914

Lamarr (1914-2000) was an inventor who mainly worked with technology, which lead to her invention of frequency hopping. What began as an invention aimed to prevent others from tracking missiles was later applied to other areas, such as wifi, GPS, and LAN. It is important to note that she did all of this behind the scenes, where her main focus was acting, which is what she is more commonly known for today. Link text -Jay

Gertrude Elion

Jan 23, 1918

Elion (1918-1999) was a biochemist and pharmacologist. She is most famous for inventing (along with 2 others) a more rational drug design that focused on the target of the drug more than using trial and error. In addition, she helped create the first immunosuppressive drug. As a fun fact, she was the ninth woman in science to earn the Nobel prize. Link text - Jay

Julia Robinson

1919

Julia Robinson was born in Missouri and after setbacks in her youth she graduated from Berkley with a mathematics degree and later her doctorate. She helped solve Hilbert's 10th problem, an academic challenge published in 1900. The solution of which involved the J.R. Hypothesis (after her). She was not allowed to teach in the math department at Berkley until after she was elected to the math section of National Academy of sciences 1975 because her husband taught calculus there.
-Solomon

Alice Ball

1920

Scientist Alice Ball find the cure for Leprosy. Years after she passed away they named the method of producing the treatment after her called the “ball method” . She was born in 1982 in Seattle Washington and later passed away there in 1916. Ball went to college at the University of Hawaii and the University of Washington. She specifically studied and did research in the field of chemistry.

Rosalind Franklin

Jul 25, 1920

Franklin studied physics and chemistry in London. She was working with Maurice Wilkins to study the structure of DNA, but regular conflict caused them to work separately. Wilkins found other scientists, Crick & Watson, to work with. Wilkins showed them a photograph taken by Franklin of DNA. Using this image, they were able to publish their double-helix model of the molecule. She died of ovarian cancer at the age of 37 in 1958. After her death, Watson & Crick made her assistance known.
- Blair

Dorothy Vaughan

Sep 20, 1920

Dorothy Vaughan (1910-2008) was an African American mathematician who worked for NACA and NASA. She began working at Langley Laboratories during World War II, and she remained when the lab began hiring African American women to process aerospace data in the segregated “West Area Computing” unit. She soon became well known and respected across the entire lab and was the head of the West Area unit for nearly a decade. When she joined NASA, she began pioneering work on electronic computing. -JN

Dr. Marie Daly

1921

Marie Daly was a biochemist who made major contributions with her research in the chemistry of histones, protein synthesis, the relationship between cholesterol and hypertension, and creatine uptake by muscle cells. She was the first African American to receive a Ph.D. from Columbia University and the first AA woman to receive a chemistry PhD in the US. She was committed to developing programs to increase the enrollment of minority students in medical school and graduate science programs. - JC

Annie Jump Cannon

1922

born dec 11, 1863. A pioneer of representation of Deaf Women in STEM. Attended Wellessly College in 1922 where she studied math, biology, physics, and astronomy. Around the time of her graduation, photography was just invented, she studied it as well, applying it to astronomy by taking photos of the stars. There was no classification system of the stars in the science community, so Cannon developed one: the Harvard Classification Scheme. Astronomers today still use her classification system!

Cecilia Payne

1925

Born in 1900, Payne graduated from Cambridge University before moving to America to pursue Astronomy. She made history during the 1920s as the first person, masc or fem, to earn a doctorate in Astronomy from Harvard. Her 1925 doctorial thesis is considered a foundational text in the science, finding correlations in material composition across stellar bodies and definitively proving Hydrogen as the most abundant element in the universe. - Charles Begle

Muriel Cooper

1925

Cooper is best known for her work within the field of design, however she also made incredible advancements within the field of technology. She created software that allowed for design to be done electronically. She was one of the first people to really explore the digital medium through a design lens. She is also accredited in the making of the MIT Media Lab, among other things. Although she died in 1994, she was already looking towards 3D as the newest design frontier to conquer. -Kaitlyn K

Dr. Jean Langenheim

Jul 5, 1925

Dr. Jean Langenheim (1925-2021) was an American plant ecologist and ethnobiologist. She did field research across five contents and a wide variety of climates. She earned her PHD in biology from the University of Minnesota. She was the second woman president of the Ecological Society of America and during her time as president, she "initiated a project to document women's experiences and contributions to the field of ecology and conducted a follow-up project in 1996."
- Marley DC

Ruth Benerito

1930

Ruth is a physical chemist most famous for her work in saving the cotton industry. She helped create more easy and comfortable fabrics out of materials such as nylon and polyester. She was born and raised in New Orleans. She started college at the age of 14 at the H. Sophie Newcomb Memorial College of Tulane University and graduated a year later at the age of 15! Outside of doing research and creating wrinkle-resistant cotton she worked as a teacher. She later started working at the USDA. - A.R.

Ruth Benedict

1930

Ruth Benedict was the first female leader of anthropology in the United States in the 1930s and held the position of the President of the American Anthropological Association. She changed the course of anthropological studies by urging anthropologists to look at both folklores and cultures as one field instead of separate entities. Benedict is also the author of the world-famous book, Patterns of Culture in which she writes that cultures are just a consistent pattern of thoughts and actions.

Jane Goodall

Apr 3, 1934

Jane is an English primatologist and anthropologist most famous for her work with chimpanzees. She did a 60-year study about interactions between chimpanzees in Tanzania in 1960. In April 2002 she was named a “UN Messanger of Peace” and is a member of the World Future Council. She was born in London on April 3rd, 1934, and is 87 today. She studied at Newham College and Darwin College. Climate change activism is something she also takes part in.
- Amy Roberts

Sylvia Earle

1935

Earle was a marine biologist and oceanographer. She was the first woman to descend to a depth of 100 feet. She did this while she was 4 months pregnant as well! Earle led a crew of five women on a two week journey to the seafloor. Earle has led more than 100 excursions in oceans around the world since then. In 1990, she became the first woman to serve as the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration's chief scientist. One fun fact is she has cumulatively spent one year underwater! -SG.

Ina May Gaskin

1940

Ina May Gaskin is an American midwife who has been described as "the mother of authentic midwifery." She helped found the self-sustaining community, The Farm, with her husband Stephen Gaskin in 1971 where she markedly launched her career in midwifery."
-Lynette Santos
http://www.midwife.org/ina-may-gaskin

Dr. Roger Arliner Young

1940

In 1940, Dr. Young earned a doctorate in zoology. She's the first African-American woman to do so. She fought to receive credit for her work in print. Unfortunately, while her colleagues received credit for their work, due to her race, sex, and class, she did not receive credit in those publications. She became to first black woman to be published in the journal Science. The Roger Arliner Young Fellowship Program was started in her honor to help underrepresented communities go to college. - AWC

Wangari Maathai

1940

Wangari Maathai (1940-2011) was a biologist and environmental/social/political activist. She was the first African woman to receive the Nobel Peace Prize (2004) and the first female from East and Central Africa to take a doctorate, and the first female professor ever in her home country of Kenya. Maathai founded the Green Belt Movement, elected member of the Parliament of Kenya and served as assistant minister for environment and natural resources in the government of President Mwai Kibaki.SD

Dr. Patricia Bath

Nov 4, 1942

Dr. Patricia Bath was an ophthalmologist. She was the first African American to complete an ophthalmology residency program at Columbia University (1973) and the first woman to chair an ophthalmology residency program(1983). She is most notably known for inventing the Laserphaco Probe. This device was able to precisely treat cataracts and restore the sight of people who had been unable to see for up to 30 years. She worked on this device for 5 years and received a patent for it in 1988. - JMC

Mamie Phipps Clark

1943

Mamie was encouraged by her parents to pursue physics and math in college. At college, she met her future husband, Kenneth, who convinced her towards a psych major. She graduated magna cum laude in 1938 and began work in a law office, where she saw the effects of racism first hand. She later completed her master's with a thesis on racial identity and self esteem. Though often overlooked, she made great contributions to ending segregation, and is famous for the Clark Doll Test. -Connie M

Jocelyn Bell Burnell

Jul 15, 1943

Jocelyn (1943-present) was an astrophysicist from Northern Ireland who is known for discovering the first radio pulsar stars. She graduated from the university of Glasgow and Cambridge then began work on observing quasars which had just recently been discovered. During that research she observed a previously unknown object that pulsed regularly which became known as a pulsar. This work later resulted in a Nobel Prize in 1974; her supervisor Antony Hewish was a recipient but she was not. JN

Sandra Bem

1944

June 22nd 1944 - May 20th 2014
A psychologist known for her work in androgyny and gender studies. She and her husband were prolific speakers on the negative impact of stereotyped gender roles on society. Bem also testified in several cases against stereotyped recruitment advertising of companies like AT&T and the Pittsburgh Press.
Bem worked as a professor in several universities across the country, retiring from tenured position at Cornell in 2010.
HYD

Lidija Liepiņa

1945

Lidija Liepiņa was a Latvian chemist who was active throughout the two world wars. I found her story particularly interesting, as her material research and gas mask development were influenced strongly by politics. I think her mixed heritage highlights the ethical responsibility of scientists; with my own Latvian heritage, I sympathize with her position, where the advancement of her career elevates the position of women, while also empowering the USSR to terrorize Latvia. Elisa R.

The ENIAC Programmers

1946

The ENIAC Programmers were a set of 6 women who secretly created the first all electronically programmable computer. In '46 their project was presented publicly but the women who worked on this project were never credited. The publicity focused more on the machine itself rather than the exceptional women who made it a reality. However now The ENIAC Programmers Project recognizes the importance of crediting these women and is actively working to spread awareness of these women's contributions. BD

Dr. Shirley Ann Jackson

Aug 5, 1946

Dr. Jackson is an African American physicist. She was the first African American woman to earn a doctorate degree rom MIT. From 2009 to 2014 she served on the President's Council of Advisors on Science and Technology. In 2016 she received the National Medal of Science from President Obama. Her research has been used to invent fiber optic cables, portable fax, solar cells, touch tone telephone, and the technology behind caller ID and call waiting. - JC

Sumita Mitrą

1949

Sumita Mitrą is an Indian-American chemist and inventor born in 1949. She attended three different universities all for different forms of chemistry. She was a professor at the University of South Florida. She is best known for inventing the nanomaterials that make up 3M Dental composites and other materials used in dentistry.
- AR

Zaha Hadid

Oct 31, 1950

Zaha Hadid (1950-2012) was an Iraqi-British architect, artist, and designer. She was born in Baghdad, and went to the Architectural Association School of Architecture in 1972. She "adopted painting as a design tool and abstraction as an investigative principle to 'reinvestigate the aborted and untested experiments of Modernism [...] to unveil new fields of building.'" One of her well known buildings is the 2012 Olympic Aquatic Center.
-MDC

Sally Ride

1951

Sally Ride (1951-2012) was the first female astronaut to go to space. She contributed to the field of science not only through her research, but through her contributions to the community. She founded a company, Sally Ride Science, with some partners in 2001, in an attempt to promote scientific curiosity within children. After her death from pancreatic cancer in 2012, she was awarded a medal of freedom for her bravery and contributions to expanding our knowledge of space.- Kaitlyn K

Radia Joy Perlman

Dec 18, 1951

Born in Portsmouth, Virginia Perlman would attend MIT where she would learn to code and develop a system which engages younger children with code. After graduating Perlman would eventually develop the Spanning Tree Protocol which is needed for the function of network bridges. She would later go on to teach and several institutions as well as help write multiple textbooks related to her work.
David Benson

Mae Jemison

1956

Mae Jemison is an engineer, physician, and former NASA astronaut. She became the first black woman to travel into space when she served as a mission specialist aboard the Space Shuttle Endeavour. She graduated from Stanford University in chemical engineering and African-American Studies and then earned her medical degree from Cornell. Jemison was a doctor for the Peace Corps Before joining NASA. Jemison left NASA in 1993 and founded a technology research company. SD

Gladys West

1956

Gladys West (1930 – present) is a mathematician whose extremely detailed model of the Earth became the foundation of GPS that is used today in countless applications, including navigation and communication. In 1956, shortly after graduating with a master's in mathematics, she was hired by the U.S. Naval Surface Warfare Center, at the time becoming only the second Black woman ever to be hired at the facility. She only started to receive recognition after the release of Hidden Figures in 2017.

Susan Solomon

Jan 19, 1956

Susan is an atmospheric chemist who was the first to propose that CFCs were responsible for the Antarctic hole in the ozone layer. Her research led to the U.N. Montreal Protocol banning CFCs worldwide. One interesting fact is this accomplishment is considered to be one of the most successful environmental projects in history because the ozone layer has shrunk a substantial amount since the CFCs were banned. [Link text](www.livescience.com/amazing-women-in-math-and-science.html). -Shane Green

Dr. Ellen Ochoa

May 10, 1958

Dr. Ellen Ochoa (May 10th, 1958) was born in LA California and grew up in La Mesa California. She has a bachelor’s degree in physics, along with a masters and doctorate in electrical engineering. Her main area of study is optics and computer communications. Holding 3 patents for optical systems, she also is the first Latina director of the Johnson Space Center and was the first Latina astronaut. She is also a member of the U.S. Astronaut Hall of Fame.
-Marley

Lise Meitner

1966

Lise Meitner was a Jewish nuclear physicist who was instrumental in discovering nuclear fission. She was forced to flee her home due to Nazi invasion and left her research with her male colleagues. Meitner was never credited for her contributions in nuclear fission until 1966 when she was finally awarded the Enrico Fermi Award along with her colleagues. Before that she was nominated for 48 Nobel Prizes in physics and chemistry. -- AWC

Stephanie D. Wilson

Sep 27, 1966

Stephanie D. Wilson is an engineer and a NASA astronaut. She is the second black women to go into space and holds the title for most logged days in space, 42, by any black astronaut. She was selected by NASA in 1996 and has completed 3 space flights since 2006. She served as NASA’s Space Station Integration Branch Chief from 2010 to 2012. In 2017, she was named head of the Mission Support Crew branch. Link text - JMC

Dorothy Hodgkin

1968

Dorothy Hodgkin was awarded the Nobel Prize in 1964 for solving the atomic structure of molecules such as insulin and penicillin using X ray crystallography, she also was disabled, diagnosed with arthritis at 28 years old, very uncommon at the time.

Kim Swift

1983

An American video game designer, Swift attended the DigiPen Institute of Technology. Swift's final project at university consisted of a physics-based game that would catch the attention of Valve Software and lay the ground work for one of the most revolutionary games of the 2000s. Swift has continued working on other games and with other developers sharing her expertise even today.
David Benson

Dr. Merritt Moore

1988

Dr. Merritt Moore graduated from Harvard majoring in physics and then earned her PhD in Atomic and Laser Physics from the University of Oxford. She also pursues a professional ballet career, previously with the Zurich Ballet, Boston Ballet, English National Ballet, and Norwegian National Ballet. Her current residency at Harvard's ArtLab combines ballet and science to show her personal relationship with science and teach science through dance performance. SD

Jesse Shanahan

1991

Jesse Shanahan is an astrophysicist and disability activist. She has Ehlers-Danlos Syndrome, a genetic connective tissue disease that causes pain and impacts her ability to move. During graduate school she researched the spectroscopic signatures in active galactic nuclei. She currently works as a machine learning developer with Peltarion conducting research in AI ethics and language processing bias.
She started the hashtag #DisabledAndSTEM to discuss experiences of disabled people in science -MK

Tiera Guinn Fletcher

1995

Fletcher (1995-) works in the realm of aerospace engineering, and graduated from MIT in 2017 with a 5.0 GPA. She has worked as an engineer for Boeing and is now working for NASA on their Space Launch System. She looks up to other black female scientists in her field, and is an advocate for increased diversity in the field. Link text - Jay

Greta Thunberg

2003

Greta Thunberg is a contemporary Swedish environmental activist. She has been active in conferences, protests, and strikes. Her speeches take climate science into the real world, citing facts to drive actual political change, and merging environmental studies with political science.
Elisa R

Maryam Mirzakhani

Aug 13, 2014

Mirzakhani (12 May 1977 - 14 July 2017) was an Iranian mathematician and professor. She earned her PhD from Harvard (2004) and became a professor of mathematics at Princeton (2004) and Stanford (2009). In 2014, she became the first (and only woman since) to be awarded the Fields Medal. She earned the award for her work with the dynamics and geometry of the moduli spaces of Riemann surfaces. In 2017, she died from breast cancer at the age of 40. Justin Blake

Daisy Shearer

2018

Daisy Shearer is a PhD candidate in experimental condensed matter physics in the UK. She has received a masters in physics and a teaching certification. She was diagnosed with autism as an adult, and has spent a lot of her time working on a project that shares the stories of neurodivergent people that work in scientific fields. During her first year, her autism impacted her grades and motivation. However, she was still able to be successful and is in the process of obtaining her 3rd degree. BC

Fatemah Alharbi

2019

Fatemah (?-present) is a computer scientist with a specialty in cyber-security. Originally from Saudi Arabia, she is now a doctoral candidate at the University of California - and has improved security for companies like apple by finding flaws in them. She 'hacks' large companies, like apple and Microsoft to find flaws in their design. She continues her work in computing today. - Solomon

Alison Wright

2020

Alison is a trans neuroscientist that recently completed her PhD. She works with the Spinal Injury Project, her work leading to several published papers as well as the development of new techniques surrounding the subject of finding functional recovery from spinal cord injury. Often trans people within the scientific community are discriminated against and ignored, but Dr. Wright is an example that trans in STEM is possible. -Connie M

Kayla Aloyo

2021

Kayla Aloyo (1990-present) is a Rocket Propulsion Engineer currently working as a Propulsion Fluid Analyst on the Reaction Control System for the Dynamics Human Landing System concept. She has worked as a Launch Vehicle Systems Engineer on the Commercial Crew Program at NASA Marshall Space Flight Center assisting the Launch Vehicle Lead Engineer through certification of the SpaceX F9, Demo-2 launch on May 30th, 2020.
-Lynette Santos