Women's innovation
Women who changed the world.
Barred from laboratories, hospital staffs, engineering faculties and often from the patent process itself — and present in the record anyway, with numbers, dates and archives to prove it.
Sarah E. Goode
Among the first Black women to receive a US patent
Explore profileSarah Boone
Dressmaker who redesigned the ironing board
Explore profileMadam C. J. Walker
Built a manufacturing and distribution system from nothing
Explore profileAlice Augusta Ball
Chemist who made the first effective leprosy treatment injectable
Explore profileKatherine Johnson
Computed the trajectories that put Americans in orbit
Explore profileMarie Van Brittan Brown
Patented the first home video security system
Explore profilePatricia E. Bath
Ophthalmologist who invented laser cataract surgery apparatus
Explore profileValerie L. Thomas
NASA scientist who patented the illusion transmitter
Explore profileGladys West
Mathematician behind the geodetic Earth model used by GPS
Explore profileShirley Ann Jackson
Theoretical physicist in condensed matter and telecommunications research
Explore profileMarian Croak
Engineer of voice over IP and text-to-donate
Explore profileHadiyah-Nicole Green
Physicist developing laser-activated nanoparticle cancer therapy
Explore profileRebecca Lee Crumpler
First African American woman to earn a medical degree in the United States
Explore profileJane Cooke Wright
Oncologist who moved chemotherapy from last resort to protocol
Explore profileMarie Maynard Daly
First African American woman to earn a chemistry doctorate in the United States
Explore profileDorothy Vaughan
NACA's first Black supervisor, who taught her unit to program
Explore profileMary Winston Jackson
NASA's first Black female engineer
Explore profileAnnie Easley
Rocket scientist and programmer of the Centaur upper stage
Explore profileBessie Blount Griffin
Physical therapist who built a feeding device for amputee veterans
Explore profileAlexa Irene Canady
First Black woman neurosurgeon in the United States
Explore profileMae Carol Jemison
Physician, engineer and the first Black woman in space
Explore profileMaggie Aderin-Pocock
Space scientist and instrument engineer
Explore profileWangari Maathai
Biologist who turned reforestation into a national method
Explore profileTebello Nyokong
Chemist developing light-activated cancer therapy
Explore profileSegenet Kelemu
Molecular plant pathologist working on crop resilience and insect science
Explore profileFrancisca Nneka Okeke
Geophysicist of the equatorial ionosphere
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