10 Most Famous Female Scientists

Marie Curie (1867-1934)

French-Polish Physicist

Alma mater: The University of Paris

Famous for:

• Pioneer in research on radioactivity.
• First female who won the Nobel Prize.
• First person and the only female who won Nobel prize two times.
• First woman professor at the University of Paris.
• The Theory of Radioactivity.

Rosalind Franklin (1920-1958)

English Chemist

Alma mater: University of Cambridge

Famous for: 

• Structure of DNA and RNA
• Structures of viruses, coal and graphite.
• “Thermal expansion of coals and carbonised coals.” (Publication)

Chien-Shiung Wu (1912-1997)

Chinese-American Physicist

Alma mater: National Central University, China and University of California Berkeley

Famous for:

• Manhattan Nuclear project where she separated uranium into Uranium-235 and Uranium-238 isotopes.
• She is known as “First lady of physics” and “Queen of nuclear research.”
• Beta decay and conservation of parity.

Maryam Mirzakhani (1977-2017)

Iranian-Mathematician

Alma mater: Sharif University of Technology, Tehran (BSc) and Harvard University (PhD)

Famous for:

• First woman who won “Fields Medal”, the most prestigious award in mathematics.
• Firs Iranian who was honored with the award “fields medal.”
• In 2005, she was acknowledged as one of the top 10 young minds by popular “Science” magazine.

Kalpana Chawla (1961-2003)

Indian-American Astronaut / Engineer

Alma mater: Punjab Engineering College Chandigarh, India and University of Texas

Famous for:

• First Indian woman in space.
• One of the seven crew members who died in space shuttle “Columbia” disaster in 2003.

Elizabeth Garret Anderson (1836-1917)

British physician and surgeon

Education: She got education privately with physicians in London Hospitals.

Famous for:

• First woman doctor in great Britian and first dean of British medical school.
• First woman who was elected mayor of Adelburgh
• She led a movement for women to be allowed medical profession.

Grace Hopper (1906-1992)

American Computer Scientist

Alma mater: Yale University

Famous for:

• Pioneer in computer programming and development of COBOL, a high level programming language.
• She served as rear admiral in United States Navy.

Vera Rubin (1928-2016)

American Astronomer

Alma mater: Georgetown University

Famous for:

• Galaxy rotation problem
• Rubin-Ford effect
• “Origins: The lives and worlds of modern cosmologists” (Book)

Alice Ball (1892-1916)

American Chemist

Alma mater: University of Hawaii

Famous for:

• Treatment of Leprosy
• First woman who received master’s degree from the University of Hawaii.
• First female chemistry professor at University level.

Dr. Azra Quraishi (1945-2002)

Pakistani Botanist

Alma mater: University of The Punjab, Lahore (MSc) and University of Paris-sud, France (PhD)

Famous for:

• Research on tissue culture.
• Study of organogenesis and callogenesis.
• She increased potato production in Pakistan upto 5%.