Women scientists

[jinasphinx]

Last night I was calling my daughter "Marie Curie," as I often do when she tries to pour one cup into another or is fixated on stirring her milk at the dinner table. My husband asked if there was some other female scientist we could call her, one who hadn't died of radiation poisoning, and I was at a loss. I knew about Rosalind Franklin, who discovered the double-helix structure of DNA (though Watson and Crick got credit), and Augusta "Ada" Lovelace and Grace Hopper, but I couldn't think of any others. Which is pretty embarrassing for me, as a woman trained in science. So here are a few:

• Barbara McClintock, a geneticist who discovered transposable genes, and the first recipient of the MacArthur "genius" grant


• Jane Goodall, a primatologist who has spent a lifetime studying chimpanzees


• Lise Meitner, a physicist who discovered nuclear fission (though Otto Hahn got credit)


• Elizabeth Blackwell, the first woman to receive an M.D. degree