Forgotten Women in Science
Throughout history, women scientists have made groundbreaking discoveries that fundamentally changed our understanding of the world, yet their contributions were often overshadowed, uncredited, or deliberately erased from scientific narratives. Rosalind Franklin's critical X-ray crystallography work revealing DNA's double-helix structure was used without her knowledge by Watson and Crick, who received the Nobel Prize while her contribution went unacknowledged during her lifetime. Lise Meitner provided the theoretical explanation for nuclear fission after being forced to flee Nazi Germany, yet her research partner Otto Hahn alone received the Nobel Prize for the discovery they made together. Katherine Johnson calculated flight trajectories for NASA's early space missions by hand, including John Glenn's historic orbit of Earth, but remained virtually unknown until decades later when her story emerged in "Hidden Figures." These examples represent just a fraction of women whose scientific brilliance persevered despite systematic barriers from denied education and laboratory access to publication restrictions and outright theft of their work reminding us that the history of science we've inherited is incomplete and that genius has always transcended the artificial boundaries of gender, though recognition often has not. Shutdown123