History’s Most Brilliant Female Scientists: Cecilia Payne-Gaposchkin
Cecilia Payne-Gaposchkin, who told us what stars are made of. Source: Wikimedia Commons
This English scientist studied botany, physics and chemistry at Cambridge University in the early 20th century, but migrated to the U.S. to be able to graduate and obtain her degree, something she could not do in the U.K. because of her gender (Cambridge, despite allowing women to study, refused to award them degrees until 1948).
At Radcliffe College — now part of Harvard — Payne became the first person to obtain a PhD in Astrophysics. In her thesis, which has been called “undoubtedly the most brilliant Ph.D. thesis ever written in astronomy,” she explained that stars were made of hydrogen and helium.
However, it wasn’t until years later that Payne’s discovery was broadly accepted, and this only happened because Henry Norris Russell — a man who actually cautioned Payne against presenting her conclusion that the sun was made predominantly from hydrogen — published similar findings. As you might guess, Russell received popular credit for it.
Nettie Stevens
Nettie Stevens, American geneticist. Source: Wikimedia
This American geneticist, who completed her PhD in 1903, was the first to discover the importance of the Y chromosome in determining a given species’ sex. Before that, the scientific consensus was that the mother and environmental factors determined one’s sex.
A sadly familiar theme in this list of important female scientists, it was her male boss, Thomas Morgan — who had initially dismissed Stevens’ thoughts on the Y chromosome — who got credit for her 1905 discovery.
Next, read up on Ancient Greek scientist Hypatia. Then, after learning about some of history’s most accomplished female scientists, check out stories on the woman who delivered 3,000 babies at Auschwitz and Maria Mitchell, the United States’ first recognized female astronomer.
