Women Inspiring Innovation Through Imagination: Celebrating Women in Science, Technology,
Engineering, and Mathematics March, 2013
The National Women’s History Project
Honorees
March, 2013
Marilyn BarrettK-12 STEM Educator & Coordinator of Science
Instruction for Worchester County Public Schools
Olga Frances LinaresAnthropologist and Archaeologist, work centers on the
social organization and agrarian practices of the Jola peoples living in the Casamance region of Southern Senegal
Helen GreinerMechanical Engineer and Roboticist, co-founder and former
President/Chairman of iRobot Corp
Katherine Burr BlodgettPhysicist and Inventor, 1st women research scientist for General Electric Schenectady,
New York Lab
Dr. Elizabeth Blackwell – 1st female admitted to an all male medical school
Flossie Wong StaalVirologist and Molecular Biologist, her team deciphered the structure
of the HIV virus as the cause of AIDS, continues pioneering work
Susan GerbiMolecular Cell Biologist, George Eggleston Professor of Biochemistry @ Brown
University, her research team devised a method to map the start of DNA replication at the nucleotide level
Hattie Elizabeth AlexanderPediatrician/Microbiologist, developed 1st effective remedies for
Haemophilus Influenzae, drastically reducing mortality rates
Julia MorganArchitect, 1st woman architect licensed in California
Mary G. RossMechanical Engineer, 1st woman engineer at Lockheed’s Missiles
Systems Division (1952) 1st known Native American woman engineer
Dian FosseyPrimatologist and Naturalist, studied the gorillas of Rwanda made
many discoveries documented in Gorillas in the Mist (1983)
Edith ClarkeElectrical Engineer, 1st woman professor of Electrical
Engineering at the University of Texas @ Austin
Rita R. Colwell, PhDMolecular Microbial Ecologist and Science Administrator, 1st woman Director
of the National Science Foundation, leader in K-12 STEM Education
Rear Admiral Grace Murray HopperComputer Scientist/Pioneer in Programming, U.S. Navy Officer
Jill PipherMathematician, president of the Association of Women in
Mathematics, and director of he Institute for Computational and Experimental Research in Mathematics
Louise PearcePhysician and Pathologist, Rockefeller Institute, contributed to cure for African Sleeping
Sickness (1919) and tested the drug in Belgian Congo (1920)
Susan SolomonAtmospheric Chemist, Ellen Swallow Richards Professor of
Atmospheric Chemistry and Climate Science @ MIT
Patricia Era Bath, O.D.Ophthalmologist, Inventor of the Laserphaco Probe an
advancement in laser cataract surgery, 1st AA woman doctor to receive a patent for a medical purpose
GREAT WOMEN RULERS OF SCIENCE
Countess of LovelaceMathematician, 1st Computer Programmer
Dr. James Miranda Stuart Barry1st woman Surgeon in UK
possibly transgendered or intersexed
Florence Sabin1st woman to hold a full professorship @
John Hopkins School of Medicine
Annie JUMP CannonContributor , Contemporary Stellar Classifications
Inge LehmannSeismologist, Discovered the Earth’s Inner Core
Marie Curie1st woman to win Nobel Peace Prizes in multiple
sciences Physics 1903 & Chemistry 1911
Gerty Cori1st U.S. woman to win a
Nobel Peace Prize in Science 1947
Irène Joliot Curiejointly with her husband Frédéric Joliot-Curie was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize in
Chemistry in 1935 for the discovery of artificial radioactivity
Rachel Fuller BrownAlong w/ assistant Elizabeth L. Hazen developed the 1st effective
antibiotic against fungal disease in humans
Margaret MeadOne of the greatest contributors to
Cultural Anthropology and sexual mores in western culture
Barbara McClintockCytogeneticist, awarded 1983 Nobel Laureate in
Physiology/Medicine
Henrietta Lacks – The Immortal Life of HeLa
Sally Kristen RideIn 1983 became 1st American woman and youngest at 32 to enter space
Maria Goeppert MayerTheoretical Physicist, 1963 Nobel laureate for proposing the nuclear
shell model of the atomic nucleus
Rita Levi MontalciniItalian Neurologist along w/ Stanley Cohen received the 1986 Nobel
Prize in Physiology/Medicine for the discovery of nerve growth factor (NGF)
Dorothy Mary HodgkinBritish Chemist, Credited with the development of protein
crystallography, confirmation of the structures of penicillin and vitamin B12, 1986 Nobel Prize in Chemistry
Gertrude ElionBiochemist, 1988 Nobel Prize in Physiology/Medicine for
the development of new drugs that lead to AIDS drug AZT
Rosalind E. FranklinBritish Biophysicist, X-Ray crystallographer, Contributor to the understanding
of fine molecular structures of DNA, RNA, viruses, coal and graphite
Dame Jane M. GoodallBritish Primatologist, Ethologist, Anthropologist, chimpanzee expert and UN Messenger of Peace
Hypatia of AlexandriaGreek Neoplatonist Philosopher, Astronomer & Mathematician