Alice Ball was an African American chemist who discovered the most effective treatment for leprosy during the 20th century. She accomplished this incredible medical breakthrough as a young woman of color in STEM during the Jim Crow era. However, Ball might have been merely a footnote in the annals of scientific history as she was uncredited for several decades for her work. Breaking Barriers Alice Ball was born on July 24, 1892, in Seattle, Washington. Her father was a lawyer and her mother was a photographer. According to Biography.com, her grandfather, James P. Ball Sr., was a pioneer in daguerreotype photography. Ball's interest in chemistry was credited to growing up around the compounds used to develop photos. During her childhood, her family briefly lived in Hawaii because they believed the warmer weather might help Ball Sr.'s health. After his death, they moved back to Seattle. She excelled in school and obtained multiple graduate degrees from the University of Washington and the College of Hawaii (now known as the University of Hawaii). Ball was a brilliant young scientist, and she became the first woman and the first African American to receive a master's degree from the University of Hawaii. In addition, at just 23 years old, she was the university's first female chemistry professor. How Alice Ball Developed a Leprosy Treatment While working toward her master's thesis at the University of Hawaii, Ball researched the active ingredients of kava root. Dr. Harry T. Hollmann at Kalihi Hospital in Hawaii was impressed with Ball's thesis and recruited her to help with his own research into the treatment of Hansen's disease, commonly called leprosy, according to the National Society of Black Physicists (NSBP). Leprosy is an ancient disease with social stigmas due to a lack of understanding. The bacteria responsible for this infectious disease cause a range of defects, such as noticeable skin lesions or extreme disfigurements. During Ball's lifetime, the disease was considered highly contagious and incurable, and people with the disease were often sent to live in isolated colonies. According to NSBP, leprosy patients were sent to the Hawaiian island of Molokai to spend the rest of their lives. The best-known treatment included naturally derived chaulmoogra oil, but scientists couldn't figure out how to effectively apply it. According to the University of Washington School of Pharmacy, the big challenge was that chaulmoogra oil was water-insoluble. As a topical, it was sticky and didn't penetrate the skin. It also had such a bitter taste that patients usually threw up if they attempted to swallow it. If they tried to inject it under the skin, it was so viscous that it burned and bubbled up in visible rows of oil under the skin. In 1915, using her expertise from extracting chemicals from the kava root, Ball figured out how to isolate chaulmoogra oil's ester compounds and chemically modify them to make a less viscous compound that the human body could absorb. Her method was successful, and it enabled 78 leprosy patients to leave the hospital quarantine and reunite with their families, according to Mic. Her method was used to develop therapies to treat leprosy patients until new advancements in the 1940s. Belated Accolades Tragically, Ball died a year later, when she was only 24 years old. Mic reports that she died after accidentally inhaling chlorine gas during a demonstration in class. Arthur Dean, the College of Hawaii president, initially took credit for Alice Ball's innovative leprosy treatment. He even published her findings on extracting the active ingredient in chaulmoogra oils and called it the "Dean Method." Ball left her mark on history despite dying tragically young and living in a society that discouraged women of color in STEM fields. In 1922, Ball's fellow researcher and former boss Dr. Hollman published an article describing "Ball's Method," which gave her proper credit for the achievement. Despite this attempt at correcting history, Ball's work remained largely unrecognized until 1977, when historians discovered her story in the University of Hawaii's archives. In 2000, Hawaii declared February 29 as Alice Ball Day.

Celebrating Alice Ball

Role models are powerful. As a young girl, one of my favorite television programs was "I Dream of Jeannie," a 1960s television show about a male astronaut who had a beautiful but impetuous female genie. I didn't want to be the genie; I wanted to be the astronaut and fly to the moon. But I had never seen a near-sighted African-American female astronaut. My dream was seemingly cut short before it even began. I eventually did make my way to NASA, and now I'm passionate about providing role models for girls in STEM. Women in STEM Fifty-seven years after real-life "Hidden Figures" Katherine Goble, Mary Jackson and Dorothy Vaughan helped pave the way for the United States to land safely on the moon, NASA announced the appointment of Holly Ridings as its first female flight director. Given the importance of this accomplishment for women in STEM, why did it take nearly six decades for a woman to make this achievement? As the former NASA Chief Information Officer, a mathematician and woman, I am passionate about doing everything that I can to help improve the representation of women in science, technology, engineering and mathematics (STEM) fields. The measures organizations like NASA have taken to close the gaps are necessary but insufficient if we as individuals do not do our part. First, we must examine our individual biases as barriers to gender inclusion. Next, regardless of our gender, we must serve as role models for girls and young women to encourage them to pursue STEM. Finally, we need to care and to understand that our society has a challenge to overcome and that we can contribute to the solution. STEM and Gender Bias Sydni was a young girl I was tutoring in 8th grade algebra. She was a good student who loved math and understood the course content well. However, when it came to assignments and tests, she lacked confidence. I worked closely with her, and over time, her confidence increased. Eventually she told me that her teacher had noticed that she was improving but had discouraged her from studying mathematics in college, telling her instead that she needed to study something like English. Sadly, she took his advice: Sydni did not pursue mathematics.  A recent study by Wang and Degol showed that the proportion of female STEM employees is much lower than the proportion of women scoring very high on the standardized tests used to source talented STEM professionals. Why would the teacher discourage Sydni if not for some unconscious bias that dictated that only boys study STEM? We must all, especially teachers, examine these biases that affect our interactions to ensure that we are encouraging, not discouraging, young girls, and not adversely affecting the STEM pipeline. Representation Matters In January 2018, Airbnb hired Kenneth Chenault as its first African-American board member. At that time, they also pledged to hire a woman as the next addition to its all-male board of directors. They lived up to that promise. In August of the same year, Ann Mather became their first female board member. Many successful female executives aspire for board memberships, but we see too few examples of those who have made that achievement. The actions of board chairmen like Airbnb's CEO Brian Chesky made a difference by providing this opportunity to Mather, making clear that representation matters. Diversity and inclusion provide societal benefits that should matter to us all. Corporations like Northrop Grumman, with programs like their Inclusive Leadership Conference, see the benefit of a commitment to diversity and inclusion. However, creating a leadership culture that executes upon this commitment is critical. Leaders in power need to see and believe that gender diversity makes a difference.  Jocelyn Bell Burnell was recently awarded a $3 million Special Breakthrough Prize for her work on discovering pulsars. She was overlooked for the Nobel Prize in 1974 even though her male counterparts were honored for the work she had done. Now, Bell Burnell is taking individual initiative and donating her money to help underrepresented groups enter the field of physics. Individual Efforts Make the Difference We can make a difference. Starting with continuous self-reflection on our own biases, we can be role models or give visibility to role models to provide encouragement for those young girls who wish to pursue careers in STEM. These steps require passion and commitment to overcome barriers. Robert F. Kennedy once said that not many of us "â€¦ will have the greatness to bend history itself, but each of us can work to change a small portion of events." Perhaps the gender gap seems daunting, but if we take these small steps, we can have an impact for women in STEM. 

Making a Difference for Girls

Ellen Ochoa is an inventor, a NASA leader and a classical flutist. But she's best known as a boundary breaker: She was the first Hispanic woman in space, and the first Hispanic person to lead the Johnson Space Center, NASA's hub for human spaceflight activity. Preparing to Launch Born and raised in California, Ochoa was a talented flutist who thought about pursuing a music degree when she was in high school. But her friends from her calculus class were all going into science and engineering fields, and that helped nudge her toward physics, according to the American Physical Society. She earned a bachelor's degree in physics from San Diego State University, then she earned a master's degree and a doctorate in electrical engineering from Stanford University. She developed a keen interest in optics, the behavior and characteristics of light. As a research engineer, first at Sandia National Laboratories and then at NASA's Ames Research Center, she helped develop optical systems for information processing. During her research days, NASA says, she wrote several technical papers and co-invented three patents: one for an optical inspection system, one for an optical object recognition method, and one for a method for noise removal in images. A Career in Orbit Ochoa joined NASA in 1988 and was selected as an astronaut in 1990. She became the first Hispanic woman in space in 1993 when she served on a nine-day mission aboard the space shuttle Discovery. She brought her flute along and played it in space. (She was the first person to play a musical instrument in low-Earth orbit, too.) Ochoa flew into space three more times: Her first two missions studied the Earth's atmosphere and ozone depletion; on her third and fourth missions, she helped build the International Space Station. Across her four spaceflights, Ochoa logged more than 1,000 hours in space. "I felt like I was contributing to something larger than myself, that benefits people on Earth, and I was willing to take the risk," she told the Harvard Gazette. After her astronaut career ended, she went to work for the Johnson Space Center, first as a deputy director and then as the center's 11th director. She was the first Hispanic person and the second woman to hold the position. During her tenure as director, from 2013 to 2018, she oversaw crucial research and exploration projects, such as the first Orion flight test and the selection of four astronauts for Commercial Crew training. What Ochoa Means to Women of Color in STEM "I know that role models make a difference, and I take seriously that part of my career and life," Ochoa told the National Women's History Museum. "For young Hispanic women, there are few well-known women in STEM fields so it's even more important to let them know about the interesting and rewarding careers that they can pursue." Ellen Ochoa is a pioneer for women of color in STEM. Though there are more women in STEM than ever, they're still underrepresented in physics and engineering — women of color especially so. Ochoa didn't have many role models when she entered NASA's program out of graduate school, but she's helped open the door for more diverse candidates in the program.

Ellen Ochoa: The First Hispanic Woman in Space

A new generation of young scientists is bringing fresh perspectives to work. Generation Z, the kids who were born after millennials, is starting to graduate college and launch their careers. It's about time to extend a warm welcome to Gen Z in the workplace.    Who Is Gen Z?    According to Pew Research, this generation includes people who were born after 1996, which means the oldest Gen Zers are turning 22 this year, while most are still in their teens or younger. They've never known a world without the internet. Growing up with mobile connectivity and social media means that this generation can share their ideas anywhere, anytime. Many young scientists are making new discoveries before they've even completed their formal education.    Background    Gen Z grew up in a post-9/11 world. Their behavioral traits are shaped by the technology that surrounds them, as well as the difficult issues that occurred during their formative years, such as terrorism, school shootings and the Great Recession. According to the Society for Human Resource Management (SHRM), these dark events have inspired Gen Z to change the world.    Common Values and Attributes    Although they are just starting to enter adulthood, early research shows that American Gen Zers are pragmatic, money-conscious, entrepreneurial, global, connected and independent.     According to LinkedIn, Generation Z likes to work independently and has mobile connectivity in their bloodstreams. They have excellent online research skills and use several different sources to get their information. They take internet multitasking to a whole new level, using five screens on average. These traits provide an excellent foundation for science.    They're young and eager to change the world, but they are also practical about the work it takes to make a change.    "Ever since I was a kid (and I think I still am a kid), I have been enthralled by everything space," says Mark Fisher, a chemist at Northrop Grumman. Fisher graduated from Purdue University in 2018. He started at Northrop Grumman as an intern and was hired as an employee the summer after he finished college.    Fisher adds, "I find no greater challenge and accomplishment than the pursuit and discovery of the unknown, which is what science is all about. I want to be somewhere where I can be a part of mankind's effort to unravel the mysteries of our universe."    3 Awesome Young Scientists    This generation is already making a difference in science, even though most of them are still teenagers. Technology is part of their everyday lives, and they're not just using it to chat with their friends. They use platforms to connect with people around the world and educate them about science.    Amber Yang, Age 19    Researcher Amber Yang developed a program that can predict the future position of space junk with 98 percent accuracy — which is far more accurate than the statistical models developed by NASA, according to Forbes. She created an artificial neural network that can "recognize patterns in how space junk moves and changes orbit." A practical and entrepreneurial Gen-Zer, she's commercializing her research with her startup, Seer, while she also attends Stanford University.    Genesis Butler, Age 12    Twelve-year-old Genesis Butler is an animal rights activist. She speaks on platforms such as TedX about animal rights and how our eating habits affect the environment. She told Newsweek, "When you eat animal products, you're contributing to the suffering of animals and to the problems surrounding animal agriculture and climate change."    Peyton Robertson, Age 17    Inventor Peyton Robertson created a sandbag to combat seawater flooding and a bike with retractable training wheels. He has patented five inventions, published a paper in the "Journal of Tropical Diseases" and founded a non-profit for STEM education, according to Forbes.    Gen Z in the Workplace    The next generation of young scientists is already inventing new devices, solving real-world problems, and educating the public about science.    These are just a few examples of today's brilliant young scientists, and they're just getting started. Fisher explains, "I find that each person I talk to has a unique insight derived from their own experiences that we all can learn from if we keep an open mind. I think that there are a whole lot of brilliant young minds out there that will do incredible things for the world."    

Gen Z Brings a New Generation of Young Scientists to Work

Whether it was playing professional ball with the Chicago Cardinals in 1949 or serving as one of three female managers with Northrop Corp. during a distinguished 37-year career, Maybelle Blair has blazed trails her entire life. Batter Up! Born in the Redondo Manor area of Inglewood, Calif., in January 1927, Blair, 91, spent many of her formative years in Texas before heading off to play professional women's baseball. A right-handed pitcher who also batted right, she began her career with the Peoria Redwings in Peoria, Ill., in 1948. Blair played just one game with the Redwings due to an injury, but she showed promise and moved up to the Chicago Cardinals organization the next year. "It was absolutely wonderful. I realized that a dream came true. I played with my brother, my father back home, and here I was playing baseball — a game my father loved — for a living," Blair says. "The fans were great to us."  Enable targeting cookies to view this content.   But there were drawbacks. Players had to wear dresses that lacked any protection, so when they slid into a base or home plate, it meant an unpleasant encounter with the Earth. "I'm still digging gravel out of my rear end," Blair says with a laugh. "These days, professional players hurt a fingernail and they go on the disabled list." In case you're wondering, yes, the movie "A League of Their Own" is indeed based on Blair and her teammates who entertained crowds as part of the All-American Girls Professional Baseball League. While no one actress portrays Blair in the movie, she earned the nickname "All the Way May." She also remains friends with stars from the film, including Ann Cusack, Anne Ramsay and Tracy Reiner. Blair is still deeply involved in women's baseball, having served on the board of directors and as chair of the fundraising committee for the All-American Girls Professional Baseball League. She and league representatives are working to establish a home for girls' baseball in Rockford, Ill., similar to one that boys have in Williamsport, Pa., home of the Little League World Series. "We're trying to raise money to build a museum for women all over the world," Blair says, adding that there are women's teams in Japan, South Korea, Australia and Pakistan, to name a few. "It's just as important as it is for men. These women have the same ambitions and the same dreams. They should have the same chance. "These little girls who are coming up are dreaming of being able to play ball just like I did," she continues. "The girls who put their feet on the field at Rockford â€¦ tears were streaming down their faces. We want to create a place where they can go to play — a league of their own." Life after Baseball Following her baseball career, Blair attended Compton College and the Los Angeles School of Physiotherapy. After graduation, she worked at a treatment center in Los Angeles before starting a nearly four-decade career at Northrop Corp., where she began as a chauffeur and finished as the manager of Highway Transportation. When she started, Blair was one of just three female managers. "I loved every minute of it; I was shocked by it at first," she says. "I had a lot of backing." Blair retired in 1986 after almost four decades with the company. "We really had some good people working for Northrop," she says. "Every day going to work was such a joy." Among her favorite memories was riding in a simulated flight in a B-2 bomber. But the most exciting project she worked on was overseeing the journey of a YF-17 fighter aircraft, complete with the wings attached, from the L.A. area to Edwards Air Force Base in the Mojave Desert. Blair had to plan the route first. By the time the plane arrived at Edwards, she said, her legs were so wobbly she could barely stand — one tiny dent in the aircraft would mean complete failure. Getting the plane through downtown Los Angeles was one of the trickiest parts of the mission. Blair remembers a man staggering out of a downtown tavern and looking up at an aircraft wing. "Rather than pink elephants, he saw a fighter plane pass over him," she says. When Blair takes stock of her life, she sees a road that few, if any, would ever get the chance to travel. "I have been one of the luckiest people in the whole cockeyed world," she says. To learn more about starting a career at Northrop Grumman like Maybelle, visit us here.

Maybelle Blair Is in a League of Her Own

Many of the first women in STEM careers did not get the recognition they deserved at the time because traditional gender roles kept them out of the spotlight. Geraldine M. Hoch — or Gerry for short — was one of the earliest female STEM professionals to work for Northrop Grumman. She was a chemical engineer who invented new ways to prevent corrosion on aircraft and was a key player in Snark — a groundbreaking intercontinental cruise missile program that led to the development of one of the first digital computers and early gyroscopic and astronomical guidance systems. "At the time, her job title was administrative staff. Today, it would probably be VP of research," says Lynn Jenson, Project Manager and Advisor to the Board of the Western Museum of Flight. Early Life and Career According to her obituary, Geraldine Marie (Holm) Hoch was born on June 10, 1924 in Independence, Missouri. She was a studious child who graduated from high school at age 15, earning an award for being the best English student in her school. She was interested in math and science, although she grew up during a time when career options for women were mostly homemaker, teacher or librarian. After high school, she attended Southwest Missouri State Teacher's College and was selected for "Who's Who for Colleges and Universities" in 1940. She excelled in math and science and taught physics at Air Force classes at the age of 17. After graduating with honors degrees in physics and mathematics, Gerry was hired by Bendix to work in the research and development department. She left Missouri to seek better aerospace career opportunities and headed to Los Angeles, California. She was hired by Northrop Aviation and worked alongside founder Jack Northrop. She could often be found in the laboratory and at ribbon-cutting ceremonies as part of a publicity campaign to promote the company's efforts to recruit women during and following World War II. She met Harry Edward Hoch, an industrial engineer, at a restaurant where employees met to carpool to work. They ended up agreeing to purchase a car together to help with the commute, and eventually they moved closer to Northrop and got married. Later, they moved back to Kansas in 1952 to start a family. Gerry took time off while she had three babies, and then she returned to work a few years after her youngest was born so she could contribute financially while her husband started a business. Back in Kansas, she got a job at Midwest Research Institute where she worked on new materials and techniques to support the space program. She brought home samples of freeze-dried hamburger so her kids could try astronaut food, and she brought home a few laboratory mice that became her children's pets. Although she was recognized for her professional talents, she wasn't paid fairly. At the time, men were often paid better salaries because they were considered the default head of household. Midwest Research Institute told her that, because she was earning a secondary income for her family, she would be paid an administrative salary. An Industry Leader Hoch left Midwest Research Institute and was hired at Lockheed, which quadrupled her salary and hired her as a Research Scientist specializing in metallurgy. She specialized in corrosion research and helped design methods for aircraft to identify and inhibit erosion on aircraft skins to prevent catastrophic damage. Gerry and her team earned patents and received royalty checks for this invention. "She was a key person at Lockheed in coming up with a new, innovative way to protect airliners from corrosion, and at Northrop Grumman, she likely contributed to the fuselage panels for the 747," says Jenson. He adds, "I'm sure that we used her process in manufacturing those 747 skins, I suspect that on that program she could have also been involved with the jet propulsion." In an era with very limited opportunities for women in STEM, she was honored and recognized as an industry expert. In 1971, she received an invitation addressed to Mr. Geraldine Hoch that asked her to present a paper at the NATO conference. She accepted the invitation and traveled to Belgium to speak to scientists and engineers about her work. Hoch suffered from cancer but continued to work at Lockheed while she was sick. She died on May 3, 1973 at age 48 in Los Angeles. Diversity and Innovation The legacy of Geraldine M. Hoch demonstrates the lasting benefits of a more inclusive workplace. As one of the first women in STEM, she contributed to aircraft manufacturing best practices such as corrosion prevention that are still in place today. Her career serves as an early example of the positive impact a diverse culture can have on the STEM fields. "When we include [women] in these programs, the whole is greater than the sum of the parts," says Jenson. "You have a synergistic effect. The more diverse you can be, the more innovative you're going to be." Being on the forefront of change, especially regarding space, physics, and engineering has been part of the Northrop Grumman culture for generations. Click here to search jobs in these areas of scientific innovation. Check out Northrop Grumman career opportunities to see how you can participate in this fascinating time of discovery in science, technology, and engineering.

Innovative Women in STEM: Geraldine M. Hoch

Only one person can say they've both visited space and the deepest part of the ocean. In 1984, astronaut Kathy Sullivan was the first American woman to spacewalk. That experience wasn't even the peak of her career — it was only the beginning of it. She continued to become a leader in space and ocean exploration.  In June 2020, she became the first woman to travel to Challenger Deep, the deepest point in the ocean.   Foundation for Exploration  Kathryn Sullivan grew up during the space race and was fascinated by the people who explored the unknown.  "I was always following the early astronauts, Jacques Cousteau and the early aquanauts. They were inquisitive people," Sullivan told CNN Travel. "They were clever people that could figure out how to go make things happen."  Despite her curiosity for understanding how things work, and the fact that her father was an aerospace engineer, Sullivan never dreamed she would become an astronaut. She had many interests and a knack for learning languages. When she started college at the University of California, Santa Cruz, she intended to study Russian. Then she took an oceanography course to fulfill a science requirement for her degree. She loved the class so much that she pivoted to oceanography.  Next, she studied marine geology at Dalhousie University in Nova Scotia, Canada. While there, she mapped a portion of the sea floor and assisted with field research on the volcanic processes that make the ocean crust. Later, in an oral history interview for Johnson Space Center, she explained that her goal as a student was to eventually get into a research submarine and explore the bottom of the sea.  "That's what I was heading toward and aiming everything toward until NASA came along," she said.  New Frontiers in Space  While she worked toward her Ph.D., her brother, an avid pilot, encouraged her to apply to NASA. It was 1976, and the space administration started to recruit women and minorities. She was focused on oceanography and didn't expect to be selected, although she saw the parallels between the mission specialist role and oceanographic expeditions.  She joined NASA in 1978 as part of the first cohort of astronauts to include women, according to the New York Times. This launched a 15-year career in space. In 1984, she became the first American woman to walk in space when she floated outside the Challenger space shuttle to repair a part. Her career continued with a second historic mission in 1990. She was part of the Discovery space shuttle crew that deployed the Hubble Space Telescope, the most powerful telescope in space for 30 years. (Soon to be succeeded by the James Webb Space Telescope.) She rounded out her time at NASA on the Space Shuttle Atlantis mission in 1992. In total, she logged 532 hours in space.  The Deepest Part of the Ocean  From the unique vantage point of space, she was more motivated than ever to understand and improve life on Earth, she explained in a lecture captured by the American Academy of Arts & Sciences. After NASA, she returned to her original passion for oceanography. Just like the astronauts and aquanauts who she observed as a child, Sullivan felt called to explore the most desolate and unknown regions of the world.  According to Business Insider, after NASA, Sullivan served as chief scientist of the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA). In 2004, President George W. Bush appointed her to the National Science Board. Later, President Obama appointed her to serve as NOAA's deputy administrator in 2011, and she became administrator in 2014.  In June 2020, having already achieved numerous accomplishments, she broke another barrier for women in STEM. At age 68, Sullivan traveled to the deepest point in the ocean, a location so remote and dangerous that only seven other people have been there.  Business Insider reports that astronaut Kathy Sullivan joined millionaire adventurer Victor Vescovo in a submarine to explore Challenger Deep, the lowest point in the Mariana Trench. Located 200 miles from Guam and seven miles below the ocean's surface, she traveled to a point that is so deep it could fit Mount Everest inside, with a mile to spare. Just like her space travels, it was a risky but rewarding mission.   She leaves a lasting legacy for women in space and other scientific fields. Not only can you be the "first" to do something, but you can also be a whole person with diverse interests and skills that evolve with age. Sullivan proves that women can explore the depths of Earth and beyond. 

Astronaut Kathy Sullivan Reaches the Deepest Point in the Ocean

Peggy Whitson's space missions are iconic. She spent 665 days in space, more than any other woman or U.S. astronaut, and she commanded the International Space Station (ISS) twice. Whitson retired from NASA in June after a successful career that broke records and demonstrated the incredible value that women bring to science and space. "I have hit my radiation limit," Whitson told Business Insider. "So [I'm] not going into space with NASA anymore."  A Farm Girl Who Became One of the Most Successful Female Astronauts Whitson was inspired to explore space at nine years old when humans walked on the moon for the first time in 1969. "I thought, what a cool job! It really didn't become a reality to me to become a goal until I graduated from high school, which was coincidentally the same year they picked the first set of female astronauts," Whitson said in an interview with NASA. After growing up on a farm in Iowa, Whitson went on to study biology. She double majored in biology and chemistry — completing college in just three years — and went on to Rice University to study biochemistry. Whitson worked as a post-doctoral fellow at the Johnson Space Center; in 1989, she was hired by NASA to be head of the Space Center's biochemistry section. "I've always said I've never had a real job because I've always done what I wanted to do, which was work at NASA," Whitson said. At Johnson, Whitson served in a number of scientific roles that involved joint projects between the U.S. and Russia — the Soviet Union at the time — which prepared her for her future leadership role at the ISS. However, she didn't have instant success. According to Business Insider, Whitson applied to be an astronaut 10 times before she was finally selected in 1996. After years of training on the ground, she experienced her first space mission in 2002, where she completed 21 science investigations and became NASA's first space station science officer. Peggy Whitson's Space Missions and Achievements On each of Peggy Whitson's space missions, she set new records and changed perceptions of gender and its representation in space. In 2008, during her second mission, she became the first female commander of the ISS, according to NASA. She continued to break glass ceilings back on Earth, where she became the first woman and first non-military person to serve as chief of the astronaut corps. From 2016 to 2017, she was back in space, yet again setting records. She became the first woman to command the ISS twice, the oldest female astronaut and the most experienced female spacewalker, rounding out her career with "10 spacewalks totaling 60 hours and 21 minutes" in space outside an aircraft, said NASA. On one spacewalk, Whitson saw her reflection in an array of solar panels. She told Business Insider, "I could see myself in a space suit, I could see the Earth behind me in the solar arrays, and I was like, 'holy cow, I really am an astronaut!' Because you forget. You're in this moment. You're getting a job done." Want to work with female engineers who are changing the game? Check out our careers page.  [tweet width="500" id="943151969081937920"]    

665 Days in Orbit: Peggy Whitson's Space Missions

Dr. Roger Arliner Young was the first Black woman to earn a doctorate in zoology. As a pioneer in marine biology, she was ahead of her time, excelling in scientific research while facing racism, sexism and health issues.  Education and Career  Dr. Young lived in the first half of the 20th century, an era when racism and sexism were overt and widespread. She excelled in research, but in the classroom, she was a mediocre student. According to Encyclopedia.com, Young studied at Howard University, where she earned Bs and Cs and took seven years to graduate.  She originally planned to study music but then took her first science course, general zoology. Dr. Ernest Everett Just, a prominent Black biologist, taught the course. He was the head of the Howard University biology department and well-known in the field. Young only earned a C grade in the class, but Just saw her potential and convinced her to pursue science.  After graduation, she taught zoology at Howard University and then went to the University of Chicago to pursue a master's of science degree in zoology. According to the University of Missouri-Kansas City, while in graduate school, she was invited into Sigma Xi, an honor society for research scientists like Albert Einstein.  She spent her summers working with Just at the Marine Biological Laboratory in Woods Hole, Massachusetts. Based on this research, she published her first scientific paper, "On the Excretory Apparatus in the Paramecium," in the September 1924 issue of Science — a competitive, multidisciplinary scientific journal.  This achievement made Dr. Roger Arliner Young the first Black woman to research and publish professionally in her field, according to Encyclopedia.com. In subsequent years, she published additional studies on the effects of direct and indirect radiation on sea urchin eggs.  Dr. Just was pivotal in launching her career. He nurtured her interest in zoology, and they worked together for many years. He entrusted her with serving as the interim head of the department while he traveled internationally.  Trials and Tribulations  She returned to the University of Chicago for her doctorate studies under biologist Dr. Frank Lillie. Despite her obvious aptitude for field research, she failed the Ph.D. qualifying exam. According to Encyclopedia.com, the relationship between Young and Just deteriorated after her Ph.D. failure. In 1936, she was fired from Howard.  She alluded that the distractions of sharing a workload with Just eventually effected her career. According to Encyclopedia.com, Young wrote in a letter to Lillie that her failure was due to "responsibilities that were not wholly mine but were not shared, and the weight of it has simply worn me out."  Perseverance  She persisted with her scientific pursuits and eventually completed her doctorate in zoology from the University of Pennsylvania in 1940. She taught at the North Carolina College for Negroes (now North Carolina Central University), Shaw University, Jackson State College and several other colleges in Texas, Louisiana and Mississippi.  In addition to scientific accomplishments, she found time for social advocacy. She joined the NAACP in 1944, worked for the Tobacco Workers International Union and helped register voters.  As if the overt racism and sexism of her era weren't enough, Young also faced personal challenges, including physical and mental health issues, possibly related to her work with radiation.  She spent much of her life caring for her ill mother. Young had developed mental illness throughout the years, and when her mother died in 1953, her mental health suffered. She lost her teaching positions and taught kindergarten part-time to make ends meet.  According to UMKC, Young was living in poverty with failing mental and physical health. She checked into the Mississippi State Mental Asylum for treatment and was discharged in late 1962. She held a few temporary teaching positions and died in 1964. Throughout her life, Young broke barriers and faced incredible challenges. Like other scientific geniuses such as Alice Ball and Nikola Tesla who suffered from their work, her legacy is strong and lasting.  

Remembering Dr. Roger Arliner Young

Maybelle Blair is everything you would want a 91-year old, former professional baseball player to be. She is passionate and witty and exudes the type of energy that is simply contagious. I had been told stories about Maybelle since I was a little girl — she hired my dad at Northrop Grumman in 1979. That one decision shaped my life and led to my interest in having my own career at Northrop Grumman, to the point that I feel forever indebted to Maybelle. Having the opportunity to sit down with her to talk baseball, Northrop and "A League of Their Own" was exhilarating and renewed my passion for the job I do at Northrop Grumman.  Shana: Tell us about the All-American Girls Professional Baseball League and what it meant to you as a girl who loved to play baseball. Maybelle: Oh, it was absolutely wonderful. It was probably one of the most exciting times of my life. I had all this opportunity, and at the time I didn't realize it. All I was doing was playing the sport I loved. And that was baseball, not softball. I never thought I would ever be able to play professional baseball. Because, you know, girls just didn't play baseball professionally, and today they still don't — but we're working on that. We want to have a league of their own again. Shana: Are you part of a movement to bring back girls' baseball? Maybelle: That's what I'm working for â€¦ to get girls a league of their own. To give them the opportunities that I had — to open doors for them. They want to play baseball, not softball. And it's so wonderful. These little girls come up to me and say, "I know every word of the movie, and I want to be a baseball player too."  Enable targeting cookies to view this content.  Shana: Speaking of the movie, "A League of Their Own," are you "All the Way May?" Maybelle: Yeah, that's what they called me. Everybody calls me All the Way May, 'cause I guess I'm nuts, I don't know. [Laughs] I hit a lot of home runs. Before the movie came out, nobody even knew that we played baseball, especially here in California. We played in the Midwest, so unless you knew someone personally, you would not know they played in the All-American Girls Professional Baseball League. Shana: What was it like watching those actresses tell your story? Maybelle: It was wonderful, absolutely wonderful. Penny Marshall [the director] was really great to us. About 90 percent of the movie is true; the rest was just Hollywood stuff. Like, a man couldn't go into our dressing room. Never. Our chaperone always took care of us. And you know, like, Madonna running out and catching the ball up against the fence? Well, it was a guy standing up there who dropped it into her mitt. And Geena Davis doing the splits and all of that, that was a man dressed like a woman. You take all of the Hollywood stuff out of it, and it was absolutely correct. They did a fantastic job. And these gals have become my very, very good friends now. Shana: Can you tell us about your early experiences working for Northrop, now Northrop Grumman? Maybelle: Well, I started off years and years ago when I was in high school. I worked during the summers in public relations. I would make scrapbooks with all the pictures of the aircraft coming in. Mr. Northrop would come in all the time, so I got to know him. In fact, I had a little softball team I put together, and he'd come out and say, "Boy, you sure are throwing good today, Maybelle." He was the greatest guy, honest to God. Every time I think of him it brings tears to my eyes because everyone loved him so. That's why working at Northrop was so great. If I had to go back and do it again, that's exactly what I'd want to do, work at Northrop. Shana: And you saw the flying wing take off? Maybelle: I did see the flying wing take off, I'll never forget that! Jack Northrop was way ahead of his time as an engineer — that was the start of the B-2. When the B-2 Bomber took flight, I said, "He's smiling ear to ear because that was his dream, and it's up there flying." Mr. Northrop ran his company first class. Everybody was family. At one time, I think he knew everybody by name. Shana: How did you go from intern to employee? Maybelle: One summer I worked in the mailroom. I was very fortunate because the manager liked how I worked and asked me to come work full time in transportation. I decided I needed to learn everything. So, I became a courier, and after that I became a dispatcher, and then I learned how to drive all the equipment. I worked my way up and took every step to become a manager. I worked hard and dedicated myself to my job and to the company. Shana: At that time, you were only one of three female managers. What was that experience like? Maybelle: Well, at that time, I didn't realize it. I was just doing my job, and I loved every minute. Northrop was the best company in the whole cockeyed world. It still is. They opened the doors for so many people, not only for women. They gave more opportunities, and we had more vacation time and better raises than other aircraft factories at the time. I was a very fortunate girl working for Northrop. I never felt like the only girl; everyone treated me with respect. We had such a great crew that it was a piece of cake for me. Of course, when I interviewed new candidates they had to like baseball or I wouldn't hire them. [laughs] That's one of the reasons I hired your dad! Shana: You did hire my dad, and that forever influenced my life and career course. My dad worked for Northrop Grumman for 30 years, I have worked here for 11, and my husband is coming up on 10. We are carrying on your legacy. Maybelle: Hey, you better carry it on, and carry it on good for me. [laughs] 'Cause that's what I worked so hard for — not only for myself, but for other people, you know. That's what I'm still doing today, working for women to have the opportunities that I had. Shana: Tell us about the big project you are working on today. Maybelle: Well, today my life is all about raising money to build the International Women's Baseball Center in Rockford, Illinois. We're going to have a museum, batting cages, umpire school, groundskeeping school â€¦ anything to do with baseball and education will be right there in that facility and open to women from all over the world. I'm traveling all over and get to speak about women's baseball — what we're doing, what we're trying to do, and what we're going to do. I just have to make sure I stay on this side of the grass. [laughs] I got to live long enough to see it through. We're going to get the league going for these girls and let them have the opportunity to play the sport they love. Shana: Maybelle, talking to you has been an absolute honor and pleasure. Thank you for the influence you have had on my life and for the service you gave to Northrop Grumman. And thank you most of all for being such an inspiration to girls of all ages who love to play baseball. Maybelle: Ah honey, well thank you, that's real sweet of you. Hey, I enjoyed you kids coming here, I'll tell ya! Visit www.internationalwomensbaseballcenter.org to learn more about Maybelle's passion. To learn more about starting a career at Northrop Grumman like Maybelle, visit us here.

Maybelle Blair: 91 Years Young

Rocketing to 300 km above sea level is a pretty great way to get noticed — but for Dr. Sally Ride, having the spotlight was never the goal. Even while actively making history as an astronaut and scientist, Ride continually eschewed efforts angling to praise her above others. In doing so, she redirected the spotlight to something she believed was far more deserving of everyone's attention: gender equity in the sciences. "Just One of the Guys" From the time her star rose as the first American woman in space to her retirement from NASA in 1987, Ride insisted on being treated as "just one of the guys," The Guardian reports. As many astronauts do, within a few years of joining the astronaut core, Dr. Ride became an expert in new areas, including flying jets, parachuting and, in her case, a new field: engineering for the shuttle's robotic arm. This last skill led shuttle commander Bob Crippen to choose Ride to join the June 1983 shuttle launch, according to UC San Diego. To Ride, it didn't make a difference that she had specialized to earn her place, or that she was one of only five women singled out from an applicant pool of 8,000 — or even that she was going to attempt the first deployment and retrieval of a satellite using the robotic arm pallet. On the eve of her much-anticipated 1983 flight on the Challenger Shuttle, she insisted that there was "nothing different" about her flight. Reimagining Leadership In an age when a woman with a PhD in physics was one in a million, Dr. Ride maintained that what she had done and what she was about to do was business as usual. Her insistence that no crew member should be treated differently from any other was publicly perceptible, according to the Guardian. On the occasion of her historic flight into orbit on the Space Shuttle, Ride declined the flowers that were offered to only her rather than to the entire crew of the Challenger. Dr. Ride's second flight was remarkable as well — not only for having the largest shuttle crew that had ever flown (seven members strong) but also for featuring the first female shuttle commander, Dr. Kathryn D. Sullivan, whose spacewalk was also a first by a female-identifying person. Ride's third flight was unfortunately marked by tragedy. As the Guardian notes, when the Challenger exploded shortly after launch in January 1986, Dr. Ride's astronaut role was reassigned. She became a presidential commission investigator into the accident that killed her colleagues, classmates and friends. Dr. Ride took this opportunity to highlight what she felt was important in her August 1987 report to the NASA administration. "Leadership cannot simply be proclaimed — it must be earned," she wrote. Ride then retired from NASA and did just that: earned her way into the leadership of the next generation of space explorers. Spreading a Passion for STEM Dr. Ride spent the next 25 years bringing space down to Earth. To help make space a key topic in science education, Ride authored seven space science books geared toward school-aged children. To help rectify the gender gap in STEM fields, she started Sally Ride Science. To this day, students entering third through 12th grade can enroll in STEM workshops through the Sally Ride Science Junior Academy. Dr. Ride made it possible for children to control satellites. Borrowing the idea from JPL's KidSat, which had flown on shuttle missions, Ride directed the installation of EarthKAM aboard the International Space Station, NASA notes. EarthKAM continues to take and transmit student-requested images. Similarly, GRAIL MoonKAM allows middle-school students to request that specific photographs of the Moon's surface be taken by the lunar-orbiting GRAIL satellites "Ebb" and "Flow."  In addition to providing numerous educational resources, Sally Ride Science (SRS) hosts leadership events for female-identifying people to share ideas and create opportunities. The annual meeting is organized by Ride's longtime partner, Dr. Tam O'Shaughnessy. Leaving Her Mark Since her passing in 2012, Dr. Ride's image has been shared in special ways to commemorate her achievements. Not only has her visage graced a postage stamp, but soon, it will also appear on a special edition of the U.S. quarter, according to SRS. Signs of Dr. Ride's legacy are also apparent in modern social movements that promote authenticity, equality and rights of personhood. The LGBTQ community has a hero in Dr. Ride, whose partner carries on her work. As Dr. O'Shaughnessy explains in a Space.com article, Dr. Ride was someone who lived a life consistent with her personal and professional values, leaving behind a legacy of being openly available as a means to promote inclusivity in the space community. Dr. Sally K. Ride was so much more than the first American woman in space. At 32, she was the youngest American ever to travel to space. Even so, she exuded the genuine humility of someone more interested in what we as a species can do. In keeping with views about leadership and empowering potential, Dr. Ride made space accessible — literally, in the case of Ride EarthKAM and GRAIL MoonKAM — to children all over the world. Through teaching, advocacy and her work as an astronaut, Dr. Ride raised the bar and shattered the glass ceiling while lowering barriers to entry for women in science, technology, engineering and mathematics. She created the space in which greatness for people of every gender and orientation becomes more achievable. She reminds us that brilliance is a universal trait — one that she mirrored back to a world full of people she believed to be equally capable, equally important and equally poised to rise to great heights. Being on the forefront of change, especially regarding space, physics, and engineering has been part of the Northrop Grumman culture for generations. Click here to search jobs in these areas of scientific innovation.

Ride of a Lifetime: Sally Ride's Adventure Into Space, Science and Advocacy

Today, we know that the universe is mostly made of hydrogen and helium. However, the person who discovered what stars are made of, Cecilia Payne-Gaposchkin, never got the accolades she deserved.  So, who was this unsung hero of astronomy?  Who Was Cecilia Payne-Gaposchkin? Cecilia Helena Payne was born in Wendover, England, on May 10, 1900. She was always interested in science from a young age, but she grew up in a time and place that didn't allow women to become scientists. According to ScienceNews, when she was a teenager, school administrators told her to leave because they couldn't meet her math and science needs.  Next, she attended the University of Cambridge, where she attempted to study physics and astronomy, but the university didn't encourage her talents, nor did it award her a degree for completing her studies.  Cecilia went to the United States to round out her academic career, and in 1925 she became the first person to earn a Ph.D. in astronomy from Radcliffe College, a women's college that is now part of Harvard University. According to her obituary in Harvard's archives, the prominent astronomer Otto Struve called her research "the most brilliant Ph.D. thesis ever written in astronomy." Her doctoral thesis was a turning point in her career and in astronomy, although her claims were so shocking that colleagues dismissed them at first. At the time, the common belief was that the stars were made of the same elements as Earth. Through meticulous observation, Payne demonstrated that the sun is actually mostly made of hydrogen and helium. The key to Payne's research was spectroscopy, which NASA explains involves breaking the light from a single material into its component colors the way a prism splits white light into a rainbow. First, Payne developed a way to quantify the intensity of absorption lines, the lines that astronomers use to identify elements based on their unique signature. Then, she spent her days and nights going through Harvard's extensive library of spectra to analyze hundreds of stars, according to Famous Scientists. She used ionization theory to build a temperature scale for stars based on their intensities, which allowed her to calculate the chemical composition of the stars. A Shocking Discovery About the Universe She was surprised to discover that all stars had similar compositions. Contrary to popular belief, Cecilia Payne-Gaposchkin found out what stars are made of: hydrogen and helium. These elements were so abundant in stars that there was more hydrogen and helium than all the other elements combined. This was such an outlandish conclusion that her thesis supervisor Harold Shapley and the highly influential astronomer Henry Norris Russell both said that she must have made a mistake. As a result, Payne-Gaposchkin downplayed her conclusion. In 1925, she printed her thesis as a book called Stellar Atmospheres. Four years later, Russell published a paper (now archived by Harvard) in which he detailed the abundance of hydrogen and helium in the sun. Astronomers continued to build on her work, eventually agreeing that stars are mostly made of hydrogen.  Today, we understand that the sun is made of 91% hydrogen and 8.87% helium. Everything else — all the other elements combined — makes up only 0.13% of the composition of the sun. By analyzing the composition of stars, Cecilia Payne-Gaposchkin changed the way we understand the universe. And she accomplished this during a time when women were overtly excluded from science. According to ScienceNews, she taught at Harvard for nearly 20 years before being listed in the course catalog. Eventually, she became the first woman to be full professor at Harvard, and the first woman to chair a department at the prestigious university. Ironically, in 1977, she received the highest honor of the American Astronomical Society, the Henry Norris Russell Lectureship, which celebrates lifetime achievement in astronomy. According to her obituary, near the end of her life, Cecilia Payne-Gaposchkin wrote:   "Young people, especially young women, often ask me for advice. Here it is, valeat quantum.  Do not undertake a scientific career in quest of fame or money. There are easier and better ways to reach them. Undertake it only if nothing else will satisfy you; for nothing else is probably what you will receive. Your reward will be the widening of the horizon as you climb. And if you achieve that reward you will ask no other." 

Cecilia Payne-Gaposchkin Discovered What Stars Are Made Of

Temple Grandin is a world-renowned expert in two seemingly unrelated topics: autism and livestock behavior. She uses her unique perspective as a person with autism to gain insights into human and animal behavior, practicing biological anthropology through firsthand observations and visual thinking. While autism spectrum disorder (ASD) made communication and socializing difficult for Grandin, she says that autism helps her notice tiny, important details that most people overlook. She has advocated for the ASD community and has done incredible scientific work with animals during the course of her career.  Childhood and Education  Born in Boston on August 29, 1947, Temple Grandin was diagnosed with autism as a young child. She didn't start speaking until age four, according to Biography.com. With support from her mother and early intervention, Grandin found ways to manage the difficulties that she faced with communication, social behavior and anxiety. She earned a Ph.D. in animal science from the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign and remains in academia at Colorado State University.  As a teenager, Grandin witnessed cattle being handled in a squeeze chute at a relative's farm. She noticed that animals calmed down when pressure was applied by the chute. This inspired her to invent a device called a "hug machine," which is a therapeutic tool that provides deep pressure to help with anxiety. In a scientific paper archived on Grandin's website, she described how the device helped her reduce anxiety and panic attacks, and overcome her sensitivity to human touch.  More Humane Livestock Handling Systems  Grandin's mind, which she has described in countless books and lectures as "thinking in pictures," gave her a unique perspective on animal science. According to Elsevier, she noticed the kinds of tiny distractions such as a reflection in a puddle or a nearby waving flag that could spook livestock. She noticed fear tendencies in animals and invented techniques to minimize fear and eliminate panic responses in animals before they're slaughtered. Her practices are not only more humane, but they also make good business sense because calm animals are more predictable and easier to handle. She has written books and scientific papers about livestock handling, with active research on cows and horses, according to several articles she authored in 2019 listed on Research Gate.  Biological Anthropology  Autism has enabled Grandin to better understand the minds of people and how their thinking styles relate to their scientific abilities, Elsevier points out. She says that people who are visual thinkers are often good at art and building things, although they might struggle with abstract concepts such as math. They are great candidates for scientific careers, such as designing experimental methods.  According to Biography.com, Grandin became nationally known after appearing in Oliver Sacks's 1995 book, "An Anthropologist on Mars," which was inspired by Temple Grandin's description of how she feels in social settings. Grandin has demonstrated the benefits of including diverse minds in science.  "When I look at the methods of an experiment, I see the actual animals, I see the experiment," Grandin told Elsevier. "So when I review journal articles, I tend to really go over the methods: the sampling procedures, what kind of animals they use. Other people are tearing apart the statistics, and I'll (notice) they didn't even tell me what breed of pig they used in the experiment. And that can affect the results in a really bad way." 

Temple Grandin Has a Mind for Science

As a child, Nancy Grace Roman was curious about the world. Thanks to her father, who was a scientist and encouraged inquisitiveness, and her mother, who pointed out the wonders of the night sky, Roman became fascinated by the stars. She wanted to know what they were made of, what they were like and how they behaved. By age 11, she formed her own astronomy club; by age 12, she resolved to become an astronomer. Little did she know, she would become one of the most celebrated female pioneers of astronomy in America.  However, she had a long road yet to travel. It was the 1930s, and there would be barriers. For instance, in high school, she asked her guidance teacher for permission to take a second year of algebra instead of a fifth year of Latin. "She looked down her nose at me and sneered, 'What lady would take mathematics instead of Latin?'" Roman recalled in a 2018 Voice of America interview. "That was the general attitude of women going into science," said Roman.  Despite this mindset, which would follow her through graduate school and into her early career, Roman became NASA's first chief of astronomy and its first female executive. She was even nicknamed the "mother" of the Hubble Telescope because of her leadership in helping to plan and manage the project that lead to the famous space-based instrument. Roman blazed a remarkable trail for women scientists, bolstering America's space program and inspiring future female pioneers to pursue careers in STEM.   Undeterred  Nancy Grace Roman was born on May 16, 1925, in Nashville, Tennessee as the only child of Georgia Frances and Irwin Roman. Her father was a geophysicist who worked for an oil company and moved the family from Tennessee to Oklahoma, Texas, New Jersey, Michigan and, finally, Nevada — all when Roman was still young. It was in Nevada, with it's clear, dark skies, that Roman fell in love with the stars. She organized her friends into an astronomy club and frequently carried around a small, thin pocketbook called "Seeing Stars," which had maps of the constellations. "I still have the book," she said in a 1980 oral history interview for NASA.  Her fascination with the stars and her natural ability to bring people together would shine later in life. But first, she had to get through school — during a time when women were discouraged from scientific pursuits. At Swarthmore College, her professor of astronomy, Dr. Peter van de Kamp, gave her the "first lukewarm encouragement" for choosing science. He told her, "I usually try to dissuade girls from majoring in physics, but I think maybe you might make it."  At the University of Chicago, she again found resistance while working on her PhD. Her thesis adviser, William Wilson Morgan, ignored her for six months. "He didn't want anything to do with me," Roman said in a 2018 video interview with NASA. She was also encouraged to accept a teaching position at another college before she completed her degree, but she persisted. Roman acquired her PhD and became the first female member of the department's staff.  It was during this time that Roman made an important discovery. She noticed that some stars containing elements heavier than hydrogen orbited the Milky Way's galactic plane in a circular path, whereas other stars that had spewed heavy elements into interstellar space (seeding new stars) had more eccentric orbits. Roman surmised that the heavier stars were younger than those with irregular orbits. "This was the first indication that common stars were not all the same age," she said in an interview with NASA, describing it as one of her favorite moments in her career. "I realized that I had discovered something important that no one had ever suspected," she said.  New Horizons  Despite gaining the respect of her peers and making important contributions to astronomy at the University of Chicago, Roman did not believe that she would be granted tenure as a full professor. She accepted a job with the U.S. Naval Research Laboratory, where she worked as a radio astronomer. In 1958, she caught wind of a new governmental organization being formed — the National Aeronautics and Space Administration. Many prominent NRL scientists were being recruited to join, including one of Roman's colleagues, Jack Clark, who had been NRL's director of geophysics and astronomy. When he asked Roman if she knew anyone who might be interested in setting up a program in space astronomy at NASA, she took it as an invitation to apply. She got the job.  For the next 20 years, she served as NASA's Chief of Astronomy and Relativity Programs, initiating many programs around space observations. Among numerous missions that she helped organize, the Hubble Space Telescope stands the most well-known. She knew that engineers at NASA wanted to build a rocket-launched telescope and that astronomers wanted one, too, but that the groups couldn't agree on the specifications. So, she organized a meeting between them to hash it out. They did.  Over the years, she worked to convince the stakeholders, including NASA and Congress, that spending an estimated $400 million in taxpayer money was worth it. She estimated that "...for the price of one night at the movies, each American would receive 15 years of exciting discoveries."  "She made it possible to get early telescopes up [into space] to learn what needed to be learned," science historian Bob Zimmerman told Space.com back in 2009. "As soon as that technology started to mature, she was pushing for the design work. Her hard-nosed nature helped get the telescope built."  Over the course of her career, she won many awards, including the NASA Exceptional Scientific Achievement Award, the NASA Outstanding Scientific Leadership Award and the Women in Aerospace's Lifetime Achievement Award. Roman retired from NASA in 1979 at the age of 54, 11 years before the Hubble Space Telescope would launch. But for her early planning work and advocacy, she was nicknamed the "Mother of Hubble."  Looking Back  She continued to work, first as a consultant and then eventually as the director of the Astronomical Data Center. In 1997, she retired for good and began volunteering. Roman was drawn to educating children and spent several years with an organization called Journey to the Universe, which brought space-based educational programs to schools in the Washington D.C. area. In 2001, NASA established the Roman Technology Fellowship in Astrophysics, meant to give early career researchers the opportunity to develop leadership skills.  On her 90th birthday in 2015, Roman looked back on her long career in an interview with NASA and expressed happiness that women could finally land senior jobs in academia and business. "They're not being quite as discouraged as I was," she said. But there was still room for growth, she said, adding that more women needed to be in senior positions and salaries were still too low. She offered this advice to women looking to advance to higher levels of management: "Remain open to change and new opportunities."  Roman died in 2018 at the age of 93. She will always be remembered for her passion and advocacy for science. 

American Astronomer Nancy Grace Roman's Legacy for Female Pioneers

Diversity and inclusion often arise as critical elements in education and the workplace. These people-centric concepts carry benefits beyond the human element alone — studies have shown that allowing a more diverse range of input fosters creative problem solving and leads to better outcomes. Garnering a diverse range of perspectives and backgrounds leads to richer discussions and ultimately fosters innovation, laying the foundation for higher profitability. Defining Diversity and Inclusion Diversity involves engaging a range of types of people. Members of a diverse group may vary in their race, gender, ethnicity, culture, disability, religion, age and sexual orientation. It can also include diversity of thought, bringing together people with unique areas of expertise. For example, if NASA needs a new spacecraft, they wouldn't only speak with the manufacturer. They would also include diverse experts on astrophysics, rocket science, engineering and other fields. Furthermore, simply having a diverse group of people is only the beginning. The biggest benefits arise when people from diverse backgrounds are not only present but also treated equitably and heard as an equal voice. When thinking about diversity and inclusion, it's helpful to understand how systems were designed with the priorities of dominant groups in mind. Thinking critically about the origins of systems — such as educational systems or a business organization — can help reveal areas for improvement. 3 Benefits of Diversity Many of the benefits of diversity are difficult to measure concretely. Doing the right thing, creating an equitable environment and enjoying deeper connections are all worthwhile reasons to embrace diversity and inclusion. But for the sake of argument, we will look at three of the most measurable results of diversity: innovation, performance and profitability. 1. Innovation When you need to solve a problem, the benefits of diversity become clear. For example, in a global crisis such as a pandemic or a natural disaster, international collaboration is crucial. On a smaller scale, if a company aims to invent or discover a new technology, it stands to reason that they wouldn't want a homogeneous group of experts but rather a dynamic group that fosters creativity. Hearing different perspectives — even if they conflict with our ideas — helps ignite new ideas. Researchers from Stanford University proved this point and highlighted what is lost when systems don't truly include diverse perspectives in an article published in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences (PNAS). They analyzed data from Ph.D. dissertations in the United States and found that "demographically underrepresented students innovate at higher rates than majority students, but their novel contributions are discounted and less likely to earn them academic positions." Katherine W. Phillips, an ethics expert from Columbia Business School, described in Scientific American how a social experiment showed racially diverse groups were better able to solve a murder mystery than homogenous groups. The benefits aren't only because people with different backgrounds bring unique perspectives that can lead to solving the problem (or, in this case, figuring out the mystery). The exercise of being around different people helps everyone challenge their viewpoints, in turn leading to more creative solutions. "Being with similar others leads us to think we all hold the same information and share the same perspective," she wrote. "This perspective, which stopped the all-white groups from effectively processing the information, is what hinders creativity and innovation." 2. Performance It can be difficult to measure performance, so a team of researchers used a performance metric that is common in academia: citations. In academic publications, the number of times that a research paper is cited by other researchers can be an indicator of the paper's success. In a forthcoming Columbia Law Review study (currently available at an open-access online repository of pre-prints called SSRN), researchers analyzed 13,000 articles published in various law reviews over 60 years and found that "law reviews that adopt diversity policies see the median citations to their volumes increase by roughly 23 percent in the five years after adoption." In other words, more diversity correlates with better performance. The researchers conclude, "If diverse groups of student editors perform better than non-diverse groups, it lends credibility to the idea that diverse student bodies, diverse faculties, diverse teams of attorneys, and diverse teams of employees generally would all perform better." 3. Profitability Diversity and inclusion promote innovation and better performance — in other words, they're good for a company's bottom line. Harvard Business Review describes research on the venture capital industry that found that diversity "significantly improves" financial measures such as profitable investments and overall fund returns. A comprehensive report from global management consulting firm McKinsey & Company finds that not only is there a solid business case for diversity and inclusion, but diverse executive teams are associated with better financial performance over time. According to their analysis, the most diverse companies are more likely to outperform their peers on profitability. For example, companies in the top quartile for gender diversity on executive teams were 25% more likely to have above-average profitability than companies with the least diversity. A Worthy Challenge Addressing gaps in diversity and inclusion can be a long path, but it is a worthwhile effort. Learning to navigate conflict and discomfort when people from different backgrounds come together represents a long-term investment. Studies — as well as real experiences — prove again and again the value of taking steps to promote diversity and inclusion in education and at work. Check out Northrop Grumman career opportunities to see how you can participate in this fascinating time of discovery in science, technology and engineering.

Diversity and Inclusion Create Better Outcomes: A Look at the Science

While women make up 46 percent of the overall workforce, women in STEM make up only 14 percent of American engineers. This statistic is up from 5.8 percent in the early 1980s, but it's still surprisingly low compared to other industries, according to the American Society of Mechanical Engineers.       However, a few innovative companies and organizations are making a conscientious effort to stand out from the crowd and promote STEM careers among women:       1. Northrop Grumman Partners With the Society of Women Engineers       In 2017, Northrop Grumman announced iReturn, a 12-week returnship program that helps prepare people who might have taken a career break for a full-time career in one of Northrop Grumman's many fields. This program was launched in partnership with the Society of Women Engineers and iRelaunch.       "'We understand the value that individuals with all types of experience bring to our company,'" said Sandra Evers-Manly, vice president of global corporate responsibility at Northrop Grumman.       iReturn is only one of the many projects launched by the SWE with Northrop Grumman. The two organizations often co-sponsor events for female engineers, run competitions for high school students interested in STEM, and more.       2. Recognition for Top Female Leaders in Technology       The Women Tech Council is a national organization that celebrates the contributions of women in technology. In 2017, they presented the Women Tech Awards to seven innovative women. "Since launching the award program 10 years ago, WTC has recognized more than 190 women including 26 university students through the Women Tech Awards," according to Cision's PR Newswire. The organization has also implemented STEM education programs in elementary schools to increase awareness of STEM careers at an early age, as well as a host of other technology-related programs for women, according to WTC.        Enable targeting cookies to view this content.       3. Google Joins the National Girls Collaborative Project       Google has partnered with the National Girls Collaborative Project, an organization that brings computer science programming to children all over the U.S., especially young girls. The NGCP has branches in almost every major U.S. city, aimed at fostering the next generation of female leaders.       4. Johnson & Johnson and Cisco Support Million Women Mentors       By 2020, Million Women Mentors hopes to pair 1 million people who work in engineering and science with girls and women who are interested in STEM careers — whether they are in high school or college or are starting their careers. Both Johnson & Johnson and Cisco donate money, time and volunteers to this effort annually — and this time and money has seemed to trickle down into workforces that subsequently prioritize more diversity than their peers.       Cisco has stated, "We have committed to the US2020 pledge — that 20 percent of our workforce will mentor students in STEM annually by 2020." Johnson & Johnson has made a similar commitment: they aim to foster mentoring initiatives to increase and retain the amount of young women in the nursing workforce by 2020.       Empowering Women in STEM       Things are improving for women in STEM, albeit slowly. According to Business Insider, "18% of software engineering jobs in the U.S. went to women in 2016, versus 16% in 2008."       A 2016 LinkedIn report found that while some U.S. industries are making strides in hiring women, others are regressing or haven't changed at all. In addition, when women do get hired, they often face behaviors or barriers that may push them out the door later on, according to CNN Tech.       Changing these statistics requires more than just hiring women; it also involves empowering a younger generation of women to get excited about pursuing engineering careers and making workplace environments welcoming to women.    

Women in STEM: Innovative Companies are Pushing for More Female Engineers

August 26 marked Women's Equality Day, which commemorates both the 1920 passage of the 19th Amendment to the U.S. Constitution granting women the right to vote and the nationwide demonstration for women's rights in 1970, according to the National Women's History Project. While women represent nearly half of the workforce, they hold only 24 percent of STEM jobs, as reported by the US Economics & Statistics Administration. However, women in STEM fields are gaining momentum. Meet Kerry Nguyen, Chemist Kerry Nguyen, a chemist at Northrop Grumman, hopes to see more women in STEM fields in the future. When Nguyen was in the sixth grade, her mother was diagnosed with cancer, so she decided to study science to better understand how cancer was diagnosed, prevented and treated. "My parents kept the news from me initially because they believed I was too young to understand the issue at the time, and they were correct," Nguyen said. She had only taken basic environmental science classes in school, but she took her curiosity about her mom's cancer diagnosis into her own hands. Her interest in science grew from there. "I wanted to learn as much as I could possibly understand about my mom's situation so I was better able to help her when needed," Nguyen added. As a first-generation American, Nguyen said her parents are her biggest inspiration. They came to the United States from Vietnam with minimal resources to start, but they always made sure she and her sisters had everything they needed to thrive. Nguyen's biggest mentor is another woman in STEM — her oldest sister, the first member of her family to attend college and a chemist who is pursuing her Ph.D. in organic chemistry. "Mary is the oldest, which meant that she made mistakes that I learned from. I continue to look up to my sister for guidance for many things, including chemistry," she said. Turning Curiosity Into a Career When it came time for college, Nguyen was already familiar with the STEM programs offered at California State University, Long Beach, near her hometown. As a student, she applied to an internship at Northrop Grumman after hearing about the position through an email from her school's career center. She was familiar with the company but had no idea that they had a chemistry lab. She was offered a position and started in the summer of 2015. "I applied to my internship position to freshen up my resume and with the mindset that I have nothing to lose but time, and I do not regret my decision one bit. I love the work I do and the support I provide for NG," said Nguyen. Nguyen graduated in May 2017 with a bachelor's degree in chemistry, and she continues to work in Northrop Grumman's lab, now as a full-time chemist. As a technical scientist, her job varies daily, and she spends most of her time analyzing chemical samples for all programs across the company. She explained: "Chemists are like the CSI of aerospace. We can determine what a material is made of or how much of a certain component is in a given material. We can test many different chemical properties using analytical and instrumental techniques." Nguyen plans to continue her work at Northrop Grumman and will earn either a master's degree in a STEM field or an MBA sometime in the future, building her technical, leadership and management skills to eventually pursue a management position. Advice to Women in STEM Fields Nguyen suggested that young people focus on networking and meeting new people to expand their opportunities. Most importantly, she urges other women who are interested in STEM to seize any opportunities without hesitation. "Do not undermine what you are capable of doing for yourself, and do not make yourself worth less than what you really are," Nguyen said. In the spirit of Women's Equality Day, she added: "Be proud to be a young woman in the STEM fields because it is rare, but we need to make it a norm. If you are curious, put your foot in the door and test out the water. You will never know unless you try, and it is never too late to be curious."

Women in STEM Fields: Advice From the Lab

Women in aerospace have been making important strides in the field ever since June 16, 1963, when Russian cosmonaut Valentina Tereshkova blasted into the blue beyond to become the first woman to travel in space. As the rocked launched, BBC notes that the 26-year-old shouted, "Hey, sky, take off your hat, I'm on my way!" Over three days, she completed 48 orbits of Earth aboard the Vostok 6, literally blazing a trail for female astronauts who followed. In the half century since, 58 other women in aerospace have demonstrated what Linda Cureton, the first African-American CIO of NASA, calls "leadership courage," the kind that helps someone overcome the fear embedded in being the first to do something remarkable: "The fear looks like voices in your head. It looks like the people saying you can't do it. It looks like a mountain too high to climb," said Cureton, who retired from NASA in 2013 and is now the founder and CEO of Muse Technologies. But it's also the fear that motivates, she said. "Courage takes that fear and turns it into preparations for success." In honor of International Women's Day, here are three courageous women who left indelible impressions on history — not just for women, but for everyone. First U.S. Woman in Space "'The moment of the launch, when the engines actually ignited and the solid rockets lit, everyone on the crew was, for a few seconds, overcome with what was about to happen to us,'" Sally Ride said in an interview for PBS. She was talking about the seconds before blasting into the cosmos aboard the Space Shuttle Challenger. But another thing was happening on that 18th day of June 1983. Ride was making history as the first U.S. woman to travel into space. As a mission specialist for STS-7, NASA's seventh shuttle trip, Ride operated the shuttle's robotic arm to deploy and retrieve communication satellites. A little more than a year later, on Oct. 5, 1984, Ride went into space for a second mission, STS-41-G. Again, she used the spacecraft's robotic arm, this time to remove ice from the shuttle's exterior and to readjust a radar antenna. Though she had an advanced degree in astrophysics and was a trained astronaut, talking with the press proved to be a difficult challenge for Ride. Journalists asked Ride questions that focused more on her gender and less on her skills. "'Everybody wanted to know what kind of makeup I was taking up,'" Ride said in an interview for PBS. Years later, for a segment on NOVA, Ride said she felt that the extra attention she received made her all the more determined to do things right. Sadly, Sally Ride passed away at age 61 on July 23, 2012, from pancreatic cancer. When her obituary was published, stating that Ride was survived by Tam O'Shaughnessy, her "partner of 27 years," the world realized that Ride had achieved another first: the first gay woman in space. First African-American Woman in Space "'I was a young girl who used to stare up at the stars. I imagined myself going there,'" said Mae Carol Jemison in an interview for NOVA. On Sept. 12, 1992, Jemison fulfilled her wish. She flew aboard the Space Shuttle Endeavour, mission STS-47, and in doing so became the first African-American woman in space. Her journey to space took an unconventional route. In 1981, Jemison obtained her M.D. degree from Cornell Medical College and began working as a general practitioner. Her passion for healthcare took her to many different countries, including Cuba, Kenya, Cambodia and Thailand, where she provided care to people without access to basic medical services. Jemison joined the Peace Corps, and from 1983 to 1985 she worked as a Peace Corps Medical Officer in Liberia and Sierra Leone. But she always had her eyes on the stars. After seeing Sally Ride go into space, Jemison said she felt that NASA had become open to accepting women into the space program. "'I picked up the phone. I called down to Johnson Space Center. I said, 'I would like an application to be an astronaut.' They didn't laugh,'" she said in the NOVA interview. On June 4, 1987, Jemison became the first African-American woman to be admitted into the NASA astronaut training program, earning the title of mission specialist. Onboard, she conducted scientific experiments related to bone cell research, weightlessness, fertility, motion sickness and others. "'Once I got into space, I was feeling very comfortable in the universe. I felt like I had a right to be anywhere in this universe, that I belonged here as much as any speck of stardust, any comet, any planet,'" said Jemison. Among many of her accomplishments, Jemison has been inducted into the National Women's Hall of Fame and the National Medical Association Hall of Fame and is a recipient of the National Organization for Women's Intrepid Award. Today, she leads 100 Year Starship, a global nonprofit initiative to ensure that humans have the capacity to travel beyond our solar system within the next 100 years. "I did always want to be an astronaut just like her," Cureton says of Jemison. But when Cureton was a young girl, she didn't see any astronauts that looked like her. While at NASA, Cureton participated in many STEM events designed to encourage girls to pursue careers in science and technology. "I wanted the young girls to see somebody like them in places that they dreamed to go," she said. First Woman Space Shuttle Commander "'When I was very young and first started reading about astronauts, there were no women astronauts,'" Eileen Collins said in a NASA press statement. Collins helped change that, and, in the course of her career as an astronaut, she accomplished two aerospace firsts: She became the first female space shuttle pilot and the first female shuttle commander. From the time Collins was a little girl, she wanted to be a pilot. She said she was inspired by astronauts, including John Glenn and Alan Shepherd, who flew in Project Mercury — the U.S.'s first human spaceflight program, running from 1958 through 1963. Even though she had no female astronauts for role models, Collins followed her dream. After earning a bachelor's degree in mathematics and economics from Syracuse University in 1978, Collins enrolled in a pilot training course at Oklahoma's Vance Air Force Base. It was one of the first classes at the base to include women. She eventually became a test pilot and in 1990 was selected as a NASA astronaut, said Biography.com. As commander of STS-93, which launched on July 23, 1999, Collins led a four-day mission to deploy the Chandra X-Ray Observatory, an instrument designed to detect X-ray emission from hot regions of the universe. In 2005, Collins served as commander for a second shuttle mission, STS-114. Throughout her career, Collins received many awards, including an Air Force Commendation Medal and a NASA Outstanding Leadership Medal. Collins was inducted into the International Space Hall of Fame and retired on May 1, 2006. Do these women inspire you to follow a career in aerospace? Check out our Careers Page to see how you can become the next trailblazer. 

Celebrating Women in Aerospace

"Without diversity in all fields, the United States will not remain technically competitive," Dr. Aprille Ericsson-Jackson told the USA Science and Engineering Festival. As the first Black woman to receive a Ph.D. in Mechanical Engineering from Howard University — and the first Black woman at NASA's prestigious Goddard Space Flight Center to receive a Ph.D. in Engineering — Ericsson-Jackson has firsthand experience breaking barriers. Throughout her busy career, she has advocated for more diversity in STEM. Aerospace Contributions As an aerospace engineer and instrument manager for NASA, Dr. Ericsson-Jackson has designed spacecraft and instruments that have helped us understand the Sun-Earth connection, space science and our own planet. Her most notable contributions include:   Predetermining the dynamics and structural reactions of satellites  NASA's Tropical Rain Measuring Mission, which helped to observe the effects of weather cycles (El Nié±o and La Nié±a)  Designing instrumentation for the Wilkerson Microwave Anisotropy Probe and the Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter  Designing a laser altimeter instrument for the ICESat-2 Atlas satellite, which measures ice sheets over Greenland and Antarctica to determine the impact on global sea level  "From peering into the distant reaches of the universe to examine things like the Big Bang Theory, black holes and gravitational waves, to our exploration efforts with the moon and Mars, to addressing a vital issue such as climate change, it has been an honor to work with so many bright and committed individuals," she told NASA, in response to winning the Washington Award in 2016. She joins other notable Washington Award winners, including Orville Wright, Henry Ford, Neil Armstrong and Bill Nye, all of whom changed the course of science and technology. Aprille Ericsson-Jackson on Women in STEM In her youth, Ericsson-Jackson was inspired by watching the Apollo missions on television. She enjoyed science and built her first scientific instruments for middle-school science fairs. In high school, she participated in a science outreach program for minority students at MIT. There, she had the opportunity to sit in the aircraft control tower and fly in a flight simulator. Her experience demonstrates the power that educational outreach has for underrepresented populations in STEM. Diversity and inclusion are important goals in STEM fields today, and Ericsson-Jackson has been advocating for underrepresented groups throughout her entire career, emphasizing the fact that the economy is falling behind because talented people are systematically excluded from opportunities in STEM fields. When she delivered the Women's History Month keynote address at the Library of Congress in 2001, she explained why there were so few young women in STEM fields: "It's not that they're incapable. It's just that they have been unwittingly discouraged from succeeding in these fields." She emphasized, "This downward spiral is especially severe for girls of color, girls with disabilities, girls living in poverty and girls who are learning English as a new language." Valuable Perspectives Dr. Aprille Ericsson-Jackson is an inspiration and advocate for STEM diversification and inclusion, with a focus on minority female students. At various speaking engagements throughout her career, she has explained that without a diverse range of perspectives in STEM, we are missing out on valuable creativity and innovation.

Dr. Aprille Ericsson-Jackson, Aerospace Engineer and Advocate for Diversity in STEM

Though often glossed over in history books as hidden figures, the women of the Apollo space program are finally being recognized for their contributions to space exploration. Aerospace engineer Judith Love Cohen is one of them. As one of the first female engineers at TRW (later acquired by Northrop Grumman), she helped to build the Abort Guidance System that brought Lovell, Haise and Swigert back to Earth on the Apollo 13's Odyssey module. She also worked on guidance computing for Minuteman missiles, ground systems for the Tracking and Data Relay Satellites, and the science ground station for the Hubble Space Telescope. Her work was essential to early years' successes and even now continues to benefit space exploration. What's more is she's also inspiring the female engineers of tomorrow. The Only Woman in Math and Engineering Judith Love Cohen was born in 1933 in Brooklyn, New York. An interview in the LA Times notes that, by fifth grade, she was the go-to person in her class for help with math homework. In middle school, she was the only girl taking intermediate algebra. Despite discouragement from career advisors who told her that math was not for young women, Cohen persevered with her passion. She enrolled in engineering school following a brief period being intent on working as a math teacher. Working as a junior engineer during the day and attending USC Viterbi School of Engineering at night, she gained her Bachelor's in 1957 and her master's in 1962. One of the Few Female Engineers After graduating, Cohen joined Space Technology Laboratories (later, TRW), working there until her retirement in 1990. She worked on several notable projects that still impact space exploration today. She was on the team that created the ground systems for the Tracking and Data Relay Satellites (TDRS) that kept NASA and others in contact with space craft, high-altitude balloons and the International Space Station, among others. Forbes describes how the satellites replaced ground relay stations for communications and data to increase the amount of in-contact time between ground control and rocket launches. The U.S. Antarctic Program notes that TDRS provided initial communications support for the Amundsen-Scott South Pole research station. Visualizing the Stars Judith Love Cohen's work also helped astronomers work with the giant Hubble Space Telescope. In a video by Cascade Pass, the multimedia publishing company she founded with her husband David Katz, Cohen explained that by listening to the astronomers who would be using the Hubble, engineers were able to add valuable functionality. Her work enabled real-time controls to focus, change filters, plan observations and collect images. She was also involved in colorizing the images collected through the various filters — when you look at the amazing images of galaxies in deep space, you're looking at Cohen's work. The Apollo Program: The Highlight of Her Career According to her obituary, written by her son Neil Siegel for USC Viterbi, Cohen considered her work on the Apollo Space Program as the highlight of her career. The Abort Guidance System (AGS) computer, developed to keep the lunar module safe during its descent to the moon's surface, became essential to keeping the three astronauts of the Apollo 13 mission alive. IEEE Spectrum magazine describes how, when an oxygen tank exploded and damaged the command module, ground control instructed the three astronauts to move to the lunar module as a lifeboat. The AGS as a standalone computer kept critical systems online as crew and mission control worked round the clock to bring the mission home safely. Another initiative was the return-to-Earth orbit. In a BBC Science Focus article, Siegel describes how Cohen lobbied hard with NASA to include this in the mission planning — and thankfully so, as it played a critical part in bringing the crew home safely. Judith Love Cohen and the Female Engineers of Tomorrow Although Cohen retired from engineering in 1990, she never forgot being the only woman in math and engineering classes. Noticing the success that her husband had in using rap music to connect with students in his work as a teacher, Cohen wondered if she could somehow encourage more girls to become engineers. So, she wrote about her experiences, and Katz created the illustrations. Her book, You Can Be A Woman Engineer, uses Cohen's story to inspire girls to study engineering. With the book's success, the couple founded Cascade Pass, releasing more than 20 titles highlighting careers that weren't often recommended for girls in school. At the time, it was difficult to pitch a book with the word "woman" in the title. Katz describes Cohen as a pioneer with the books and shares how they traveled across the country promoting the titles. They also spent time talking with Brownies and Girl Scout groups to inspire girls to think beyond the traditional for future careers. "Judith translated engineering into terms the girls would understand," he shares. "She enjoyed breaking it down for them, and getting the girls excited about the subject." According to Katz, Cohen's view was that although women and men have their differences, a woman could do anything a man could, and that included math and engineering. "I think she just wanted to make it easier for the next generations — for it to be easier for them and to be more accepted." Being on the forefront of change, especially regarding space, physics, and engineering has been part of the Northrop Grumman culture for generations. Click here to search jobs in these areas of scientific innovation.

Judith Love Cohen and the Female Engineers of Tomorrow

It may seem like the gender gap is closing, but at least in STEM fields, there is still a long way to go. Non-male scientists all around the world deal with this gap, whether you're talking about American women or Indian women. A study published in the journal Science demonstrates that this isn't due to men being better or having higher achievements in math or science. In fact, the study showed that women actually have higher achievement in math and science than men. The issue was that only the highest-achieving women pursued STEM fields, whereas men with poorer grades and test scores didn't let these lower marks dissuade them from pursuing a technical career. The issue, according to an NYU study, is confidence. "Our results suggest that boosting STEM confidence and earlier career aspirations might raise the numbers of high-achieving women in [physics, engineering, and the computer sciences], but the same kinds of interventions are less likely to work for average and lower-achieving girls, and that something beyond all these student factors is drawing low-achieving men to these fields," said lead researcher Joseph R. Cimpian in a release. This problem is persistent everywhere. India is a country well-known for excellence in STEM fields, but those areas are dominated by men. According to The Hindu, Dr. Namrata Gupta has pointed out that India's patrilineal society has discouraged women from working; it's only recently that Indian women working has been embraced and encouraged. Just 10 to 15% of people in STEM research fields in India are women. However, this doesn't mean there aren't Indian women doing incredible work. There are Indian women scientists, engineers and people working in technology who are making impressive strides and putting India on the global map. We'll introduce you to just a few of them here. Muthayya Vanitha: India's Rocket Woman India has a thriving space program called the Indian Space Research Organization (ISRO). In 2019, the ISRO sent an uncrewed mission to the moon called Chandrayaan-2 (which, according to Vox is Sanskrit for "moon craft") that consisted of an orbiter, a lander and a rover. While the lander and rover malfunctioned and crash-landed on the moon, the orbiter is still sending back data and even found water molecules on the lunar surface. Muthayya Vanitha, the project director for Chandrayaan-2, is considered one of India's "rocket women" due to her work on the mission. According to the India Times, this was the first time that an Indian woman was put in charge of a big-budget ISRO mission, though they have previously led smaller-profile operations. An electronic systems engineer, Muthayya Vanitha graduated from the College of Engineering in Guindy, Chennai, and according to Forbes India, she's been with the ISRO for 33 years. Her background is in satellite communications and digital signal processing. Vanitha was persuaded to take on the role of project director (a promotion from her previous associate director role) by M Annadurai, a famous aerospace engineer known as the "Moon Man of India." In 2019, Vanitha was named a "Person to Watch" by the journal Nature. Gagandeep Kang: A Leader Searching for a Rotavirus Vaccine Dr. Gagandeep Kang is one of the most prominent Indian scientists thanks to her work on intestinal diseases in children. She currently serves as a professor of microbiology in the Department of Gastrointestinal Sciences at India's Christian Medical College. She's the first Indian woman scientist to be invited to join The Royal Society in London. Kang trained at Christian Medical College but decided to go into public health and research rather than practice medicine. "I enjoyed the idea of public health and working with community rather than working with a single patient," she said in an interview with The Print. "So I decided to try it out, and I ended up in gastrointestinal research." She worked in the UK and the United States before returning to India to focus on Indian children. Indian children experience more rotavirus infections (which affect the intestines, causing diarrhea and vomiting) at younger ages than children in other countries and before their immune systems are fully developed. Kang's work as an Indian scientist has been crucial in the hunt for a new rotavirus vaccine. Kang has also been one of the Indian scientists on the forefront of COVID-19 policy, and according to The Lancet, her future goals lie in closing gaps of inequality within India's health care system. Kamakshi Sivaramakrishnan: NASA Scientist and Silicon Valley Pioneer From Mumbai to Pluto to Silicon Valley, Kamakshi Sivaramakrishnan makes waves everywhere she goes as an Indian woman and scientist. She was born and raised in the vibrant and bustling city of Mumbai, and according to a profile in Her Story, education was always important in her household. She got her undergraduate degree at Boston University and went on to pursue a doctorate at Stanford in information theory and algorithms. "As part of my Ph.D. program, I built a communication chip used on board the New Horizons spacecraft," Sivaramakrishnan told the San Francisco Business Times. New Horizons has since completed its mission to study Pluto and is currently in the Kuiper Belt, heading outside the solar system. Since her pivotal work on NASA's New Horizons mission, Sivaramakrishnan has pursued a different area of tech: advertising. She was the lead scientist for AdMob, which was purchased by Google in 2010. She founded the tech company DrawBridge in 2010, and it soon became the fastest-growing female-led company in the United States, according to Business Insider. It's clear that women around the world have a long way to go before achieving equality in STEM fields. But these inspiring, engaging, passionate Indian women are blazing a trail for younger women to follow in their footsteps, and they are changing the world as they do it. Are you interested in science and innovation? We are, too. Check out Northrop Grumman career opportunities to see how you can participate in this fascinating time of discovery.

These Trailblazing Indian Women Are Shaking Up Science and Technology

Jane Goodall fundamentally changed our understanding of chimpanzees, and she dedicated her life to animal welfare and conservation. Born in London in 1934, she was passionate about animals from a young age, but career options were extremely limited for women in science. "There was no thought of becoming a scientist, because girls weren't scientists like that in those days," Goodall told the New York Times. She read about Doctor Doolittle and Tarzan and dreamed of living with wild animals in Africa, but completed secretarial school and started a career working in advertising. Her scientific career took off when in 1960, she had the opportunity to travel to Kenya to visit a friend. A 26-Year Chimpanzee Study While she was in Kenya, Goodall met the influential anthropologist Louis Leakey and quickly impressed him with her work ethic and knowledge of animals. Leakey secured a grant for Goodall to study chimpanzees in Gombe Stream National Park in Tanzania, where she made groundbreaking observations that revealed that chimps are highly intelligent and social animals. She corrected common misunderstandings of chimpanzees and revealed that they aren't the gentle vegetarians that we expected. They're actually omnivorous animals that exhibit social behaviors such as affectionate displays of tight family bonds and warfare. Goodall's study redefined the line between humans and animals when she observed chimps breaking twigs from trees, removing the leaves, and poking them into termite mounds to retrieve the bugs and eat them. This proved that some animals are capable of using and making tools — a skill that had previously differentiated people from animals. At age 26, she was already one of the greatest field scientists of the 20th century, according to National Geographic. An Accidental Activist  Like many great women in science, Goodall persisted with life's work even when society expected her to solely focus on being a wife and mother (which she also was). She skipped her undergraduate degree and went straight for a doctorate. According to Britannica, in 1965 she earned a Ph.D. in ethology (the science of animal behavior). Goodall and her family lived at Gombe and continued to study the chimpanzees for 26 years. In 1986, she was compelled to leave her fieldwork and focus on activism. While at a conference on chimp behavior in different environments, Goodall attended a session on conservation. She learned that habitats were being destroyed, chimpanzees were being poached and growing human populations were encroaching on the chimps' forests. "I went to the conference as a scientist, and I left as an activist," she told the New York Times. In the years since this epiphany, through the Jane Goodall Institute and affiliated organizations, Goodall has advocated for animal welfare and conservation. She has written books and articles that educate the public and at age 86, she continues to travel the world to inspire people to protect animals and their habitats. Her comprehensive study of chimpanzees helped us understand the human relationship to chimpanzees and other endangered species. In Gombe, she discovered that people were exploiting the land and animals because they were facing hardships of poverty and lack of education and healthcare. By addressing those challenges, she was able to improve the lives of the people and the chimps at Gombe. This model evolved the way we approach conservation today.

How Chimpanzee Expert Jane Goodall Became an Activist

Botanist Yné©s Mexé­a traveled throughout North and South America collecting 145,000 plant specimens and identifying 50 new species of plants. As a Mexican-American woman who started her career at age 51, she traveled between Alaska and the tip of South America to identify and collect plants. She made lasting contributions to the scientific study of plants and achieved professional success in a male-dominated field during the early 20th century — a time marked with even more racism, sexism and ageism than today. She defied the status quo and set new precedents for female pioneers. A Hardy Upbringing and a Critical Turning Point Mexé­a brought a unique perspective to botany, entering the field with a sense of adventure and an unconventional path to science. According to PBS, Yné©s Enriquetta Julietta Mexé­a was born in 1870 in Washington, DC. Her father, a Mexican diplomat, and her American mother separated when she was very young, and she spent her childhood moving several times and attending a private boarding school. As a shy child, she was often alone. When she finished school, she considered entering a convent, but her ailing father asked her to take over the successful family ranch in Mexico. She married twice; her first husband died, and the second one bankrupted her family business. After her second husband ruined the ranch, she divorced him and suffered a mental breakdown. She then moved to San Francisco to seek medical help from Dr. Phillip King Brown, a psychiatrist who encouraged her to join California's budding environmental movement. There, she started to explore nature with the Sierra Club and the Save the Redwoods League. In 1921, at age 51, she enrolled in science and natural history courses at University of California, Berkeley, and truly developed her passion and aptitude for botany. A Condensed Career Despite her late start and the widespread barriers for women of color, she quickly rose to become a prominent botanist. Her career started to take off in 1925 when she joined a Stanford University expedition to Mexico. Convinced she would accomplish more while working independently, she split from the group and continued traveling for two years. During this time, she sent more than 1,500 specimens to the herbarium at Berkeley, according to JSTOR. Her career continued to flourish with treks to Alaska, the Amazon River, the Andes and Tierra del Fuego, the archipelago at the southern tip of South America. She traveled by foot, horseback and canoe, and often traveled solo or with a few Indigenous guides, according to the National Park Service (NPS). While collecting rare species of plants from all over North and South America, she also advocated for protecting natural resources and the rights of indigenous people. Mexé­a was a true adventure seeker who defied stereotypes. She would spend months in the field, often sleeping outdoors by choice. One of the Greatest Female Pioneers In an era when women were expected to stay home and take care of their children and husbands, Mexé­a traveled to remote locations for scientific exploration. Her career peaked during the 1920s and 1930s — a time marked by anti-Mexican discrimination and the deportation of 2 million people of Mexican descent, including many people who, like Mexé­a, were American citizens, according to History.com. In her 13-year career, she collected more than 145,000 specimens. She discovered two new genera, Mexianthus Robinson (Asteraceae) and Spulula Mains (Pucciniaceae), and about 500 new species, 50 of which are named after her, according to JSTOR. In 1938, she became sick while on an expedition in Mexico. She cut the trip short and died of lung cancer a few months later at age 68. She left her estate to the organizations that inspired her career — the Sierra Club and the Save The Redwoods League. Her discoveries and plant specimens are still used by scientists today.

Late Bloomer Yné©s Mexé­a Discovered 50+ New Species of Plants

Francis Crick was a biologist and neuroscientist whose story is intertwined with the fascinating history of DNA discovery. Crick is best known for discovering the helix structure of DNA, a discovery that changed the face of science as we know it.    Early Life   Crick was born on June 8, 1916, in Northampton, England. After primary school, he headed to University College London in 1937, where he studied physics and earned his Ph.D. in 1954, according to Biography.com.   Crick's scientific career was unfortunately interrupted by World War II. During this period, he joined a military research team focused on the development of magnetic and acoustic mines. This work was interesting to him, according to the National Library of Medicine, but not interesting enough to keep him on a military track after the war ended. After the war, Crick moved to Cambridge to study biology with the support of a scholarship from the Medical Research Council.   The History of DNA Discovery   In 1951, Francis Crick met an American scientist named James Watson at the Cavendish Lab in Cambridge, which is where their famed collaboration began. In 1953, the duo constructed a model of the double helix shape we now associate with DNA. They speculated that if you split one side of the ladder from the other, each side would become a pattern for a new strand of DNA. This explanation was later used to inform the scientific understanding of how genes are replicated, Biography.com noted.   Who Received the Credit?   Crick and Watson became known as the scientists who discovered DNA's double helix structure after they published a groundbreaking paper in Nature in April 1953. However, their research relied primarily on work from the lesser known female chemist Rosalind Franklin. Franklin would not receive credit for her contribution to the research until after her death. Her male colleague, Maurice Wilkins, shared her research with Crick and Watson without her consent, while Watson, Crick and Wilkins received the Nobel Prize for their DNA work in 1962.   Crick's Legacy   While minor changes have been made to the Watson and Crick model of DNA, it remains otherwise similar to its original construction from 1953. Based on Watson and Crick's research, we know that DNA is a double-stranded helix. We also know that the two strands are connected by hydrogen bonds, with A bases mostly paired with Ts, while C bases are mostly paired with Gs. Nature also noted that most DNA double helices are right-handed and anti-parallel.   Crick continued to study molecular biology for the remainder of his life, and he wrote several books on the topic. He won many other prestigious science awards, including the Prix Charles Leopold Meyer of the French Academy of Sciences in 1961 and the Award of Merit of the Gairdner Foundation in 1962. He died in La Jolla, California in 2004 at the age of 88. 

Francis Crick and the History of DNA Discovery

 When you first learned about DNA, you likely saw images of the beautiful double helix structure in your textbook — but you probably haven't heard about the woman who initially discovered that structure, and it's time for her to get her dues.Early Years English native Rosalind Franklin decided to become a scientist when she was 15. This was an uncommon decision for a young woman in 1930s London, and her father was against higher education for women entirely: He wanted Rosalind to become a social worker, not a scientist. But she would not be dissuaded. In 1941, Rosalind Franklin graduated from Newnham College, Cambridge, with a degree in science. For several years after graduation, Franklin worked at the British Coal Utilization Research Association on a graduate fellowship, where she contributed to important research on coal and graphite, and earned her Ph.D. Then she moved on to the Laboratoire Central des Services Chimiques de L'Etat, run by Jacques Mering, where she did her post-doctoral research and became an expert in X-ray crystallography. Eventually, Franklin moved back to London to work in John Randall's lab at King's College in London, where she met Maurice Wilkins. And although she and Wilkins were colleagues, he initially misunderstood her role and thought she was a technical assistant, which set the tone for the rest of their relationship. This assumption was common at the college, where only males were allowed in the university dining room, and all the men hung out at a men-only pub after work.Photo 51 Rosalind Franklin, for her part, was not dissuaded by this blatantly gendered behavior. She continued to work hard in Randall's lab, focusing on the X-ray diffraction studies that would eventually facilitate the double helix theory of DNA. One of Franklin's X-ray photographs, nicknamed Photo 51, spurred new thinking about the shape of DNA for the men in the lab, and that research was ultimately published under Wilkins' name in the journal Nature with little-to-no mention of Franklin. She ultimately left the lab after two years due to disagreements with her lab director, Randall, and Wilkins. Rosalind Franklin died of ovarian cancer in 1958 at age 37. She spent her final years working on research concerning the molecular structure of viruses, for which her team member, Aaron Klug, would eventually win a Nobel Prize in Chemistry in 1982. Four years after her death in 1962, Wilkins and two of his colleagues won the Nobel Prize for their discovery of the double-helix model of DNA, based on a photo taken by Franklin. Franklin's relentless research and courage weren't mentioned because the Nobel Committee doesn't make posthumous nominations, although that decision was highly contentious. While times have changed, the value of unflappable tenacity has not. Northrop Grumman is looking for innovators like Franklin who believe in breaking boundaries — people who want to tackle problems that society says can't be solved. If this sounds like you, check out their careers page.

Rosalind Franklin's Discovery is in Everyone's DNA

Gaming is on the rise around the world. According to Bloomberg, video games are exploding globally, with a 23% rise in revenue between 2020 and 2021. It's forecasted to be a $219 billion industry by 2024, helped along by the pandemic and the number of hours, days and weeks people have spent inside. Nowhere is gaming on the rise more than in India, the world's largest democracy. Of the roughly 1.3 billion people who live there, it turns out that around 400 million are gamers. According to the All India Gaming Federation, it's Indian female gamers who are driving this industry growth in the country. Let's take a look at why gaming is becoming such a force in India and what Indian female gamers are doing to push it forward. Why Is Gaming Such a Big Deal in India? The Independent reports that India has 560 million internet users, which makes it the second largest population of internet consumers in the world. Gaming was already a huge force in India, and the COVID-19 pandemic and its ensuing lockdowns only accelerated its growth. What was once seen as a solitary behavior became a way to forge connections with others. For instance, at its peak, the popular game PlayerUnknown's Battlegrounds (PUBG) had 34 million users in India. According to KPMG, just 9% of Indian gamers use a computer, and only 4% are console players. Mobile phones are the primary avenue through which gamers in India play, and the low pricing of 4G data has made gaming more accessible than ever. Between 2021 and 2025, KPMG projects 182% revenue growth in the Indian gaming industry. How Are Women Contributing to the Rise of Indian Gaming? In 2020, the number of Indian female gamers rose sharply, from 19% to 42%. Ninety-five percent of these women are playing on a smartphone, and these numbers are expected to increase over the next few years. That's an absolutely massive increase in the number of gamers in India and a boom for the domestic industry. Women are also participating in e-sports and streaming in unprecedented numbers. Payal Dhare is behind Payal Gaming, with over 2.5 million subscribers on YouTube. She's considered one of the most talented and popular female gamers in India. Another content creator for online gaming, Aparna Shukla (also known as Rog Stream), has over 2.5 million followers on Facebook. These two, along with many others, are normalizing the presence of women in gaming and content creation spaces, making room for more women within these industries. The key here is that women already make up almost half of gamers in India. Every expert prediction and market research report says that these numbers will continue to rise disproportionately, and sometime soon female gamers could easily outnumber male gamers in India. How Is This Shaping India's Gaming Industry? Indian companies are noticing sharp upward trends and rushing to cater to this quickly growing demographic of new gamers. With the rise of gaming in India, it's a good time to join the gaming industry there, and many organizations are now specifically marketing their content and games to women. Because of the country's large population and the ubiquity of smartphones, research firm Research and Markets reports that over 200 game development companies have popped up in India in the past three years. Companies are looking to make games for Indians domestically, rather than relying on internationally made games, and they're looking to research to help them tap into what women in gaming are looking for — all of which is driving the Indian video game industry forward considerably. Are you interested in all things related to technology? We are too. Check out Northrop Grumman career opportunities to see how you can participate in this fascinating time of discovery.

How Indian Female Gamers Are Driving the Growth of the Industry

Dr. Jane C. Wright has been called the "mother of chemotherapy" because of her groundbreaking cancer research. Her work in the 1950s and 1960s made possible the life-saving chemotherapy that's still used today. However, like many other Black women in science, she is not a household name, although her contributions changed the course of healthcare.   A Family of Doctors   Jane Cooke Wright was born in 1919 in New York City, according to Encyclopedia.com. She came from a family of barrier-breaking doctors. Two of her grandfathers, her father and her sister were all doctors during a time of widespread racial and gender discrimination. She grew up and built her career when women were excluded from professional settings and Jim Crow laws explicitly marginalized African Americans, according to History.com.   Despite institutional prejudice, Wright rose to prominence in the medical field and was heavily involved in scientific societies. She attended Smith College and then New York Medical College on academic scholarships. She started her medical career as an intern at Bellevue Hospital and then as a resident at Harlem Hospital, according to Encyclopedia.com. During this time, she also served as a staff physician with New York City's public school system.   In 1949, she joined her father, Dr. Louis Tompkins Wright, at the Harlem Hospital Cancer Research Foundation that he founded. At this point, her focus shifted to clinical research for cancer treatment.   What Is Chemotherapy?   So, what is chemotherapy exactly? During this time, cancer was treated with surgery and radiation, but those techniques weren't always good enough to eliminate the cancerous cells. Chemotherapy, the use of chemical agents as therapeutics, was an emerging cancer treatment that many physicians disregarded or ridiculed as being ineffective, according to Encyclopedia.com.   Dr. Wright conducted clinical trials that proved that chemotherapy could make certain types of cancer regress.   She identified specific therapies, such as triethylene melamine and methotrexate, which are still used today to treat breast cancer and childhood leukemia, according to The New Inquiry. She also refined the definition of chemotherapy, beyond simply being a single drug given as medicine to treat cancer. She advocated for combination therapy in which you administer multiple chemotherapy medications in a precise order to treat cancer as it evolves.   In addition to developing cancer treatments, Dr. Wright also changed the way that cancer is researched. She and her father demonstrated that tumor cells could be removed from the body and studied in a laboratory to find out which drugs would work best for a particular patient, according to Helix.   Contributions Beyond the Lab   She was a wife, a mother and an artist who nearly studied art at Smith College and enjoyed painting in her retirement, according to Encyclopedia.com. Wright was very active in the scientific community, publishing 135 scientific papers and holding leadership positions in scholarly societies and professional organizations. According to the National Library of Medicine, Dr. Jane C. Wright was the highest-ranked Black woman at a nationally recognized medical institution.   She was a professor of surgery, head of the cancer chemotherapy department, and associate dean at New York Medical College. In 1964, she was one of the founding seven members of the American Society of Clinical Oncology, which now has 45,000 members of cancer researchers. In 1971, she became New York Cancer Society's first female president.   According to her obituary in the New York Times, Wright didn't consider herself limited by racial prejudice. However, as a Black woman in a field that is dominated by white men, she changed the face of medicine for future generations. 

Dr. Jane C. Wright Developed Chemotherapy

The STEM fields are full of significant innovators who sadly never got the recognition they deserve. These people, many of whom are under-recognized female scientists, were pioneers in their fields. They achieved great things but didn't receive due credit because they were women of color (and often specifically Black women). In the 1950s and 60s, many Black women worked as engineers and "human computers," enabling the dawn of the space age and the era of modern computing. Dr. Gladys West is one of STEM's hidden trailblazers. She helped develop technology that contributed to the creation of the Global Positioning System, or GPS, which revolutionized modern society. Her contributions have been hidden for too long. We're excited to discuss both Dr. Gladys West and the ins and outs of how GPS works. How Does GPS Work? When we're going about our daily lives, we use GPS constantly but don't really think about what it is. How does GPS work? The United States' GPS relies on a constellation of 31 satellites in Earth orbit (other countries have their own GPS systems), according to the FAA. They work in concert with ground stations that pinpoint the precise position of these satellites at any given time. Receivers are what we utilize (our phones, car infotainment systems, etc.) to access the GPS network. Receivers are able to listen for signals from this satellite constellation. After communicating with a minimum of four separate satellites, they can pinpoint a user's location to within 7 meters, with about 95% accuracy. Dr. West's Background Born in 1930 in rural Virginia, Dr. Gladys West was the daughter of Black sharecroppers and worked the fields as a child. She knew education was her way to a different life, so through hard work, she excelled and received a scholarship to college. She earned an undergraduate degree in mathematics and continued on to pursue a master's degree. In 1956, she began her career at the U.S. Naval Weapons Laboratory. Her role was to collect and process data from satellites, which she used to help pinpoint their exact locations in space. This experience as a "human computer" helped Dr. Gladys West lay the foundations for the modern technology of GPS. Dr. West's Contributions to the Development of GPS Dr. Gladys West continued to work for the Navy and move up through the ranks due to her hard work and diligence. She participated in an award-winning study that examined the motion of Pluto relative to Neptune, which helped her understand the movement of planetary bodies and how they act upon one another. She received a commendation from her department head in 1979, which led to her becoming a project manager. Dr. West oversaw Seasat, the first satellite to track the oceans, which helped her see how tidal forces affect the shape of the Earth. As part of the Seasat team, she re-configured an IBM computer to calculate the geometric size and shape of the Earth much more efficiently. She was the first person to take all of the information we have on the Earth's movement and the forces that act upon the Earth and input them into a computer to create a precise mathematical model of our planet. Because the Earth is in constant motion, with gravitational, tidal and other forces acting upon it and changing its shape from one second to the next, it's very hard to pinpoint the shape of the Earth with accuracy — and harder still to identify the precise location of anything on it. That's why Dr. Gladys West's contributions were revolutionary. She made it possible to create an accurate geodetic model of the Earth. GPS needs to take all of these seemingly small factors into account in order to work. Though it might have seemed small at the time, Dr. West's computer program is what paved the way for pinpointing a person's location on the Earth through satellite tracking. It was this work that laid the foundations for GPS. Are you interested in all things related to technology? We are too. Check out Northrop Grumman career opportunities to see how you can participate in this fascinating time of discovery.

Hidden Figure Gladys West and Her Role in Creating GPS

As a child, Beatrice "Tilly" Shilling played with building sets and spent her spare change on tools for tinkering with projects; at 16, she bought herself a motorcycle and started modifying it. She was a trailblazer practically from the day of her birth on March 8, 1909, so it's not surprising that this British aircraft engineer would go on to solve a dangerous flaw in the Supermarine Spitfire, an iconic World War II aircraft. She was a pioneer in military aviation technology and an early advocate for women in engineering. It is quite fitting that we now celebrate International Women's Day on her birthday.   Book Smart and Street Smart      Though she was clearly skilled from an early age, Shilling hadn't considered pursuing a career as an engineer until her mother discovered The Women's Engineering Society. After high school, she secured an apprenticeship at an electrical firm owned by Margaret Partridge, who mentored Shilling and urged her to study electrical engineering formally. Shilling became one of the first two women to study engineering at the University of Manchester, where her student record card defaulted to "Mr." since all students were presumed to be male, says the BBC.    Despite the challenges, Shilling graduated in 1932 with an honors degree in electrical engineering. Work was scarce during the Great Depression, so she continued school. She earned a master's degree by researching combustion engines, which had fascinated her ever since she started motorcycling. "I got a lot of pleasure from dismantling and rebuilding this motorcycle," Shilling wrote of her teenage project in a 1969 letter in The Woman Engineer: The Journal of the Women's Engineering Society of the UK. (Skip to page 326 to read it in full).   As soon as women were allowed to race motorcycles at Brooklands, the world's first motor racing circuit, Shilling bought herself a Norton M30 and modified the engine to make it even faster. In 1934, she hit speeds of 106 mph (171 kph) to win a Brooklands gold star, according to Engineering and Technology.    Enable targeting cookies to view this content. Savior of the Royal Air Force   Following her success in both racing and academia, Shilling started working at the Royal Aircraft Establishment, which supplied the Royal Air Force with military aviation technology. During this time, it was uncommon to hire women, notes the BBC.   Shilling explains in her 1969 letter, "The Air Ministry, having had some experience of women's work in the First World War, were not entirely unsympathetic and I was offered a job as an assistant in the Technical Publications Department at the Establishment." After spending eight months writing aero-engine handbooks, she was transferred to the engine department, where she specialized in research and development on carburetors, a much better match for her skills and interest.   When World War II broke out, the Royal Air Force had an urgent problem: The engines of its warplanes were prone to cutting out mid-flight. There was a glitch in the Rolls-Royce Merlin engines that powered the iconic Supermarine Spitfire fighter plane and the Hurricane fighter-bomber. When planes performed g-maneuvers, such as dives and other aerobatics, fuel could flood the engine and cause stalling, Real Engineering explains.   Tilly Shilling fixed the defective engine problem in 1940 by adding a small disk to the carburetor that stopped the fuel surge and prevented stalling. She spent the next year touring air force bases to show them how to make the repair. Her device was a relatively easy and temporary fix so that they didn't have to refit planes, and it enabled pilots to win the war.   Post-War Life   In 1938, Shilling married George Naylor, who also raced motorcycles and worked at the Royal Aircraft Establishment. Although her work was crucial to the RAE, Shilling spent a decade as a temporary worker because jobs were only open to single women, who, as a rule, were paid less than men. In 1948, the marriage rule was removed and she became an official RAE employee. That same year, she received the Order of the British Empire and was recognized as a crucial contributor to the eventual Allied victory, according to Motherboard.   She continued aeronautical work for the RAE on projects such as solid-fuel rockets, aircraft brakes and more until she retired in 1969. Shilling stayed active in the aerospace engineering and racing communities for the rest of her life, but much like NASA's "Hidden Figures," she remains an underappreciated hero of 20th century innovation. 

Fearless Beatrice Shilling Saved the Spitfire

The first woman admitted to MIT, or any scientific institution for that matter, Ellen Swallow Richards, pioneered sanitary engineering, home economics, nutrition and environmental activism. She was the first woman in the United States to obtain a chemistry degree, and she would have pursued a Ph.D. in chemistry if women weren't prevented from doing so at the time.  Who Was Ellen Swallow Richards?  Ellen Swallow was born to a rural family farm in Dunstable, Massachusetts, in 1842. According to Smithsonian Magazine, she was a curious child who would read ingredient labels on food to learn more about nutrition. She earned her first bachelor's degree at Vassar College (an all-women school at the time), where she was mentored by America's first female astronomer, Maria Mitchell. Young Ellen wanted to be a chemist, but she couldn't find anyone willing to hire a woman for such a position or any schools that accepted women for advanced science degrees. She was able to attend MIT as a "special student." She was accepted to show that women couldn't handle higher learning, according to Smithsonian Magazine, and she was isolated from her cohort in a solitary lab.  A Groundbreaking Chemistry Career  Despite these challenges, she earned a bachelor's degree (her second) from MIT, plus a master's degree from Vassar. She continued studying at MIT for two more years and applied to the doctoral program but was rejected because they did not award doctoral degrees to women at the time. She married Robert Hallowell Richards, chairman of MIT's mining engineering department, and he supported her research, according to the New York Historical Society.  Ellen Swallow Richards taught chemistry at MIT from 1873 to 1878, although the university did not give her a salary or a title. She was recognized as a professor in 1879, but she still worked for free, according to the American Chemical Society. She advocated for more women in research and opened the Women's Laboratory where 23 women, mostly local teachers, joined her scientific pursuits.  Eventually, MIT warmed up to the idea of women in science, and her Women's Lab closed. She was appointed assistant chemist of the nation's first laboratory of sanitary chemistry in 1883. There, she studied water quality and sewage treatment, an emerging field at the time. While water testing is standard today, the concept of water quality was new when Richards participated in this research and analyzed 40,000 samples. Through this work, she helped set the stage for future pioneering women in STEM, such as environmental actistist Rachel Carson.  According to Smithsonian Magazine, Richards led a study of Massachusetts' food supply, in which her lab examined packaged food and discovered that it wasn't as pure as the labels suggested. She was a champion of domestic science, the precursor to home economics. She studied the science of baking and how science and technology concepts applied to homemaking in general.  A Powerful Voice (With a Limited Viewpoint)  Like many early activists, she advanced important causes but was not inclusive. Her work focused on advancing women like her — white middle-class housewives, according to Smithsonian Magazine.  Despite her limited views, she was one of the early pioneering women in stem who advocated for advancing women's education and careers. She pushed the boundaries of what was possible for women at scientific institutions, and her hard work proved that women's contributions were essential for the advancement of science. 

MIT's First Female Student: Ellen Swallow Richards

While the Flint, Michigan, water crisis maintains its spotlight in the news, everyday people are taking it upon themselves to help. Take Gitanjali Rao, a 12-year-old seventh grader from Lone Tree, Colorado, with a budding interest in water safety and epidemiology. An avid reader of MIT's Materials Science and Engineering website, Rao got the idea for a more effective way to test for water quality after watching the turmoil in Flint and seeing just how difficult the process was when her parents tested water in their own home, NPR reported. What Is the Flint Water Crisis? According to CNN, pipeline construction to send water from Lake Huron to Flint began in 2014. While construction was underway, the city relied on the Flint River as its main water source. Over the course of a year, multiple water tests were conducted, and each showed elevated lead levels. Since then, multiple lawsuits have been filed against the state of Michigan, the city of Flint and many of the officials involved in the switch in water source. Water Testing Needs an Upgrade Some of the most common methods of testing water for lead include sending out water samples to the EPA or purchasing at-home lead testing kits from a hardware store. The former requires a lot of time and patience, while the latter is less than reliable, said USA Today. Wrangling information from a water provider is also difficult; they may not even know the state of their pipes or what they're made from. USA Today documented the hurdles to getting this kind of information, describing an arduous process of communicating with customer service and many unanswered questions. Taking on the Challenge of Water Safety Rao felt existing methods for water testing weren't effective, and late last year, she decided to do something to change it, according to NPR. Rao's solution was a water lead contamination detector known as Tethys, named for the Greek goddess of fresh water.  In her submission video for the Discovery Education 3M Young Scientist Challenge, Rao explained that the carbon nanotubes in the device's sensor are sensitive to changes in the flow of electrons caused by heavy lead concentrations. When the sensor is submerged in water, it measures the reaction of the electrons; an app translates this data to tell the user whether the water is safe to drink. Last summer, Rao was awarded the title "America's Top Young Scientist" in the challenge, earning $25,000 and the opportunity to work with scientists from 3M to further develop her detector. What's Next for Rao?  While Rao plans on using some of her prize money for college, she also wants to invest it to develop the sensor into a commercial product to take on the ongoing water crisis. At the end of her submission video, Rao explained her hopes for the future of her device: "It can be expanded in the future for other chemical contaminants in potable water. I hope it helps in a small way to detect and prevent long-term health effects of lead contamination for many of us." If working on technology to keep people and the environment safe is what you're looking for, check out careers with Northrop Grumman.

A Young Scientist Takes on Flint's Water Crisis

 Chances are you've never heard of Henrietta Leavitt. So you may be surprised to learn that without her observations of stars in 1908, Edwin Hubble would not have spotted that the universe is expanding ... or have a space telescope named after him. Leavitt is a great example of forgotten history — not unlike that recently revealed by the movie Hidden Figures — a phenomenon in which contributions to society go unrecognized, simply because they were made by the "wrong" gender. Humans as Computers In the early 1900s computing was mostly repetitive number crunching, done manually with pen and paper, and for this reason was considered women's work. Henrietta Leavitt joined many other highly educated women in cataloging star photographs for the entirely male astronomers at the Harvard College Observatory. Eventually, working alongside other human computers like Annie Jump Cannon, Leavitt's work on variable stars illuminated a path for others to measure the universe and laid foundations for modern astronomical exploration. Born in Lancaster, Massachusetts in 1868, Henrietta Leavitt attended Radcliffe College from the age of 20 and earned her bachelor's degree in 1892. In her final years of study, Leavitt was introduced to astronomy and was immeditaley fascinated. However, like a lot of other women graduates at the time, the only way that she could pursue her interest was as a laboratory technician. She first worked as a volunteer before joining the staff in 1902 at a rate of 25 cents per hour — roughly the wage for a servant.  Laboratory head Edward Pickering set Leavitt to work cataloging the vast photographic library of telescope images from the Magellanic Clouds. These clouds, visible from the southern hemisphere without a telescope, are giant galaxies that orbit our own Milky Way about 200,000 light years away from Earth. They hold vast pockets of gas that are constantly collapsing to form new stars, and as such, hold valuable clues about the creation of the universe.  Leavitt's Law Leavitt's task lay in cataloging Cepheids within the Magellanic Clouds. These are variable stars, so named because they periodically blink brighter or pulsate at regular intervals. Examination of plates taken over the years from the telescope images eventually revealed the periodicity. As Leavitt pored over image after image, she noticed that there was a direct relationship between the brightness of each star and its period; stars with greater luminosity took longer to blink from bright to dim and back again. In 1908, Leavitt described this discovery and then expanded on it in a paper published in 1912. In explaining that the brighter stars had longer periods, she found that "a straight line can readily be drawn among each of the two series of points corresponding to maxima and minima, thus showing that there is a simple relation between the brightness of the variables and their periods." In other words, there is a linear relationship between a star's true brightness or intrinsic luminosity and the logarithm of its period.  Variable Stars Unlock the Distance Key Leavitt's Law meant that scientists finally had a better way to measure distances across space, but it took a few more steps to unlock the key. Since a star's apparent brightness steadily decreases the further it is away from our planet, there is a way to estimate distance through comparison with its calculated intrinsic luminosity using the Inverse Square Law. Henrietta Leavitt knew that if she could figure out the distance from the Cepheids to Earth, she could calibrate her data into a workable formula. Once Danish astronomer Ejnar Hertzsprung was able to establish the distance between the Earth and the Cepheids within the Magellanic Cloud, and Pickering's successor Harlow Shapley had further verified the findings, Leavitt's Law helped establish the first 'standard candle' for modern astronomy, pushing reliable distance estimation from 10,000 to 10,000,000 light years away.Per ardua ad astra The women at the Harvard College Observatory worked on tedious and repetitive data analysis; to reach her conclusions, Leavitt studied the periodicity and luminosity of around 1,777 variable stars. She also analyzed 299 plates from 13 telescopes to construct the Harvard Standard, a logarithmic scale for cataloging stars by photographic brightness. Fellow computer Annie Jump Cannon improved on a spectral class system for classifying stars developed by her predecessors, Antonia Maury and Willemina Fleming Cecilia Payne, recruited by Shapley as the first beneficiary of award funds set up by Cannon, discovered in her Ph.D. studies that the sun is largely comprised from hydrogen. This finding ran contrary to current theories at the time, but when proven showed that the metallicity of stars could be used to gauge their age and development — important concepts in the study of the cosmos. Thanks to their meticulous attention to detail, the human computers like Henrietta Leavitt pushed the boundaries of space exploration. Years before a famous telescope would bear his name, Hubble used Leavitt's Law to show that other galaxies lay beyond the Milky Way and prove that our galaxy is not at the center of the universe. With this information, he showed that the universe itself is expanding, giving rise to the Big Bang theory as an explanation for the start of the universe. Barely recognized for her contributions, Henrietta Leavitt died of cancer in 1921; a proposed nomination for the Nobel Prize in Physics only arrived four years later.

Henrietta Leavitt and the Starlight Distance Key

Dr. Marie Maynard Daly was a biochemist who studied fundamental science that contributed to our understanding of how to keep the human body healthy. Her research led to the discovery of the double helix structure of DNA and more, but like many Black female pioneers in science, she isn't a household name. Here, we celebrate her contributions to chemistry and healthcare, which she accomplished in the context of racial and gender bias.  Inspiration  Daly was born in 1921 in Queens, New York, according to Biography.com. Both sides of her family sought education at a time when Black people, women — and especially Black women — were often denied admission to traditional universities. Her mother came from a family of readers, and she often read aloud to Marie and helped her with homework.  According to Encyclopedia.com, Marie enjoyed reading Paul DeKruip's "Microbe Hunters," a popular book about Louis Pasteur and other early microbiologists. She was also inspired to become a scientist because of her father. He immigrated from the British West Indies and studied chemistry at Cornell University. But he couldn't afford to stay long enough to complete his degree, so he left school and became a postal clerk.  Education  Marie Maynard Daly earned her bachelor's degree in chemistry at Queens College and graduated with honors in 1942. Next, she earned a fellowship to continue her chemistry studies at New York University. To fill the gaps to afford school, she also worked as a lab assistant at her undergraduate school while she pursued her master's, which she completed in only one year.  She then went to Columbia University for her doctorate program. She studied under Dr. Mary L. Caldwell, an immigrant from Bogota, Colombia, and one of the great female pioneers in science who paved the way for Daly and other women. Opportunities for women in science were very limited, but with so many men serving overseas during World War II, there were more job openings for women. Daly worked in Columbia's chemistry lab with Caldwell studying the enzymes that help digest food. In 1947, Daly made history when she received her Ph.D. in chemistry. She was the first African American woman to do so, although she wasn't aware of this groundbreaking milestone at the time, according to Biography.com.  Career  After completing her formal education, she spent two years teaching at Howard University, a historically Black university in her mother's hometown of Washington, D.C. While there, she began research on the composition and metabolism of components in the cell nucleus, according to the Science History Institute. She received a grant from the American Cancer Society to support this research, which she later continued with molecular biologist Alfred E. Mirsky at the Rockefeller Institute in New York. She continued teaching and researching at various institutions, including the Vagelos College of Physicians and Surgeons of Columbia University and at the Albert Einstein College of Medicine at Yeshiva University in New York. Her research helped reveal the relationship between high cholesterol and hypertension, which bettered our understanding of nutrition and cardiology.  She studied many aspects of biochemistry and metabolism throughout her career. She conducted fundamental research that other scientists used to make famous discoveries. For example, when Francis Crick and James Watson won the Nobel Prize for the double helix structure of DNA, they cited Daly's work, according to Spartanburg Science Center.  Recognition  In 1975, she participated in a meeting of 30 minority women in science sponsored by the American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS). This led to a report now archived by MIT called The Double Bind: The Price of Being a Minority Woman in Science.  In 1986, Daly retired from Albert Einstein College and served on the Commission for Science and Technology of New York City, according to Encyclopedia.com. In 1988, she honored her parents by establishing a scholarship for minority students studying physics or chemistry at her alma mater, Queens College. She moved to her vacation home in East Hampton and enjoyed a quiet retired life with her husband, Vincent Clark, eventually moving to Florida for the mild climate.  She was inducted into the prestigious Phi Beta Kappa honor society and designated as a fellow of the AAAS. Marie Maynard Daly Clark died in New York City on Oct. 28, 2003. 

Dr. Marie Maynard Daly Paved the Way for Women in Chemistry

The United States had a secret weapon in World War 2: young women who hacked military messages. Now, these WW2 codebreakers are getting the credit they deserve. While men were fighting overseas, a different kind of battle was being fought by American women in WW2. A group of approximately 10,000 women were secretly recruited and worked behind the scenes, breaking into German and Japanese communications systems. They decoded messages that had been encrypted on multiple levels, which was extremely complicated and crucial to military operations. In contrast to those who returned from the war with stories of battlefield glory, codebreakers couldn't talk about what they were doing, so they didn't become war heroes. In the years since, these women's stories have begun to come out, thanks to efforts like "Code Girls" by Liza Mundy.  The Stigma of Women in WW2 In the World War 2 era, there was a stigma associated with codebreaking because it was considered secretarial. The prevailing stereotype was that women were better at "boring" tasks like crunching numbers, such as the "Hidden Figures" who computed rocket trajectories. Though codebreaking should have been a prestigious job, the women could be prosecuted for treason if they revealed what they were doing. Instead, people assumed the women were assisting the military men. If anyone asked, the codebreakers were told to say they emptied trash cans and sharpened pencils. Who Were the Codebreakers? During the war, Axis powers shared information in messages that were coded on multiple levels, which made them extremely difficult to break. It took a special mixture of patience, creativity and logic to break the codes and read the messages. School teachers and recent college graduates were the perfect candidates. Professors, college presidents and military officers recruited women from the Seven Sisters colleges in the Northeast and schoolteachers from the South. The women were tapped for the role because they were skilled in both math and language, andthey also had to answer a couple of questions. According to CNN, if the women liked crosswords and weren't engaged, they were considered suitable for the job. During this time period, it was assumed that married women would leave the workforce; in reality, married women such as Beatrice Schilling and Hedy Lamar were inventing new military technologies. At the height of the codebreaking program, there were approximately 4,000 women at a U.S. Navy code-breaking facility at what is now the Department of Homeland Security in Washington, D.C., and 7,000 women at Arlington Hall in Arlington, VA.  Codebreakers and Cryptology These young women pioneered data encrypting and invented early cybersecurity techniques that are still used today. According to Smithsonian, the women had to work through endless code and cipher systems, which were often layered for maximum confusion. They would spend days staring at strings of letters, trying to make sense of the scrambled messages. They might, for example, be looking at a Japanese message that was spelled out in Roman letters and then mixed up. The work was tedious, and there was no rulebook, so the women learned as they went. They used certain tricks to find patterns in the nonsensical messages, such as finding frequently used letters or looking for the coded version of "begin message here," which would give the codebreaker a place to start. These techniques helped form the basis for modern military communication, data security and encryption. They Helped End The War WW2 codebreakers were an integral part of military operations, although they didn't get credit for it. In fact, the first American to learn that WW2 was over was a female codebreaker who was head of a U.S. Army language unit. Smithsonian reports that Virginia D. Aderholt deciphered and translated the message from Japan to Switzerland (who remained neutral during the war) declaring their unconditional surrender in 1945. She decoded the message, which was then rushed to President Harry S. Truman, effectively ending the war. Aderholt was one of many exceptional women who eavesdropped on Japan and Germany to get ahead. They provided intelligence that helped Allied forces sink enemy supply ships and gun down the plane of Isoroku Yamato, "the architect of Pearl Harbor," according to Smithsonian. Female codebreakers figured out precisely where the Japanese army was located and where they were likely to be moving; discovered the origins and destinations of radio signals; and tracked the location and movement of troops. Mundy told CNN that without the WW2 codebreakers, the attack on Pearl Harbor could have been even worse. Agnes Driscoll, for example, was working on Japanese fleet code for more than a decade. She diagnosed how their system worked, figured out how to read Japanese naval communications and shared her knowledge with the male naval officers who went to the Pacific (and got the credit). The WW2 codebreakers were almost too good at their jobs. Toward the end of the war, they were supplying more information on Japanese supply ships that the military could keep up with, according to Smithsonian. Even after the war ended, the women kept the secret about what they were really doing to help with the war effort. Many of them went home, while others stayed in the intelligence community and ended up in high-ranking positions — some even outranking their military husbands.

WW2 Codebreakers Secretly Hacked Military Messages

Frances Allen was a pioneer in computer science. Recruited to IBM in 1957, Allen was an early computer scientist who was a human-to-machine translator and a trailblazer for women in STEM.  She died on her 88th birthday on Aug. 4, 2020. Who Was Frances Allen? Born in 1932, she spent her childhood on her family's farm in upstate New York. According to IBM, she studied mathematics and intended to be a teacher. Allen earned her undergraduate degree from The New York State College for Teachers (now SUNY Albany) and then a master's from the University of Michigan. She started her career as a high school math teacher in her hometown, but in order to repay her student loans, she took a position as a programmer at IBM Research. To her surprise, she ended up staying with the company for her entire career. Building the Foundations of Computer Science She specialized in early programming languages and compilers, the software programs that convert code that humans understand into binary code that machines understand. Her many notable contributions to computing include:   FORTRAN: A high-level programming language that made coding much more productive. The Turing Award notes that she started at IBM just two months after FORTRAN was released. She had to learn it and teach it to her colleagues all at once.  Compilers: Programs that translate code written in languages that humans understand into machine language that a computer's processor can use.  High-performance computing: An example is the STRETCH project, one of the first super computers, which the U.S. National Security Agency used to decode messages. Computers were primitive at the time, and she helped create STRETCH in 1961, which was by far the fastest computer in the world at the time.  Pioneering Women in STEM In an interview archived by IEEE, Allen described her early years at IBM as "a golden era for computing" when many women in STEM were employed doing highly technical work. In the early years of computing, female coders were common, but as the field matured in the late-1960s through the 1980s, women were pushed out. "As it became a profession and as processes and requirements emerged," Allen said, "there were structures that were put in place, many of which were management structures and process structures." She added, "It became an avenue that women were pretty much shut out of, in general." Allen was the first female IBM Fellow, the highest honor for a technical person at IBM. The original certificate form misgendered her, since the default had always been men.  She spent many years mentoring women who were early in their careers. In 2000, IBM established the Frances E. Allen Women in Technology Mentoring Award in her honor, according to The Washington Post. She was the first woman to win the Turing Award, a prestigious award that is akin to the Nobel Prize in computing. During her many awards acceptance speeches, Allen expressed that women were not celebrated enough for their work in computer science and was an outspoken advocate for pioneering women in STEM. Her contributions to computer science provide the foundation for today's advanced computing.

Remembering Computer Science Pioneer Frances Allen

According to the U.S. Department of Commerce, men still outnumber women in American STEM. Many programs have been created to introduce women to science and medicine at a younger age, and female scientists of the past are finally getting the recognition they so richly deserve. But still, the odds can feel like they are against women who want to work in STEM fields. That's what makes these five game-changing female scientists so impressive. These famous women in STEM are role models who are paving the way for the next generation of female scientists. Michele Koppes, Glaciologist Koppes studies our earth's response to climate change, focusing primarily on glaciers. Her recent projects include quantifying the glacier changes caused by climate change, looking at the effects of climate change on meltwater resources and understanding glacier dynamics — how they move, carve and melt. "I am fascinated with all rates of geomorphic change, particularly the effects of humans on the landscape and how we compare to other natural geomorphic agents such as glaciers and rivers," Koppes writes in her bio for the University of British Columbia, where she is an associate professor. Koppes has also been vocal about the struggles famous women in STEM face. "I constantly need to prove I am not only scientifically capable, but hardy enough to thrive in the field, in the harsh environments of my research," Koppes told TED Fellows. "Doing science properly is rife with failed attempts â€Š—â€Š on top of this, women must stand up for their legitimate seat at the table." Renee Hlozek, Cosmologist Hlozek, a South African scientist, studies the cosmic microwave background, which is the radiation left over from the Big Bang. She hopes to understand the initial conditions of the universe and how it grew into what we see today, according to TED Fellows. She developed BEAMS, a scientific method for understanding contaminated cosmological data, and has won numerous fellowships and awards, including a TED fellowship and Rhodes Scholarship at Oxford. She's currently a professor at the Dunlap Institute for Astronomy and Astrophysics. Ayanna Howard, Robot Scientist Howard once worked at NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory as a senior robotics researcher. She is now a robotics professor at Georgia Institute of Technology. One of her most well-known successes was the design of "SnoMote," a robot that could work in remote ice environments inaccessible to humans. In 2013, she founded Zyrobotics, a company that produces technology for kids living with special needs, she told PC Magazine. According to Howard's Georgia Tech bio, "her academic career is highlighted by her focus on technology development for intelligent agents that must interact with and in a human-centered world, as well as on the education and mentoring of students in the engineering and computing fields." Peggy Whitson, Astronaut Whitson is the most experienced female astronaut at NASA. She's spent 665 days in space, which is "longer than any American ever and more time than any woman worldwide," according to NPR. Whitson has taken 10 space walks, and she takes the lead as the first woman to command the ISS twice. Katrin Amunts, Neuroscientist Amunts works at the University of Dusseldorf, where her current project is creating a 3-D map of the human brain. She is one of the most prominent brain-mapping neuroscientists in the world. Amunts and her team constructed the most detailed map of the human brain to date. It could help us understand more about the brain, how it works and how it affects human behavior, according to Motherboard. The 3-D brain atlas has "50 times the resolution of previous such maps," reported the MIT Technology Review. "The atlas, which took a decade to complete, required slicing a brain into thousands of thin slices and digitally stitching them back together with the help of supercomputers ... It is a major step forward in understanding the brain's three-dimensional anatomy." Honoring Women in STEM  These women are creating brighter futures for generations of female scientists. Their groundbreaking research and developments shed light on the mysteries of the world as we know it — and their leadership in their respective fields heralds great things to come for women in STEM.

5 Famous Women in STEM Paving the Way

Dr. Mae C. Jemison is a doctor, engineer, physicist and astronaut who became the first African American woman to travel into space. Born in 1956, New Scientist noted she was part of the generation of astronauts inspired by Gene Roddenberry's TV series, "Star Trek." Watching the crew hurtle across the universe, facing the final frontier, Dr. Mae C. Jemison had no hesitation in thinking she would also fly in space one day. At the time, she discounted the gender barriers to women entering astronaut training, and they didn't deter her from wanting to boldly go beyond Earth's atmosphere. She also discounted the race barriers facing many others like her. In 1992, she made history and became the first Black woman astronaut, flying aboard the space shuttle Endeavour on an eight-day mission with six other astronauts. However, while she could picture herself in space, it's possible Dr. Jemison never imagined she would join the crew on the "Star Trek" bridge. But that's exactly what she did as the first astronaut to appear in "Star Trek." The Early Years Dr. Jemison was born in Decatur, Alabama, though her NASA biography noted she counts Chicago, Illinois as her childhood home. According to interviews, her parents supported her early curiosity and interest in science. Graduating from high school in 1973, Dr. Jemison headed to Stanford University at only 16 years old. Although she continued to face discrimination as a woman and as an African American, Dr. Jemison graduated from Stanford in 1977 with a Bachelor of Science in chemical engineering. She then chose to study at Cornell Medical School, opting for medicine over a career as a professional dancer, which was another strong interest of hers. During her time as a medical student, Dr. Jemison worked in a Cambodian refugee camp and with the Flying Doctors in East Africa, according to Runnels County Register. She graduated in 1981 and then took up general practice before joining the Peace Corps as a medical officer. Into Space and Back on Earth In June 1987, Dr. Jemison was selected for astronaut training with NASA. She became the science mission specialist on STS-47 Spacelab-J, a cooperative mission between the United States and Japan that launched on September 12, 1992. Space.com noted that the Endeavor shuttle flew 126 orbits around Earth before returning on September 20. The first Black woman astronaut, Dr. Jemison spent over 190 hours in space on the shuttle. She ran the bone cell science experiments alongside other projects the crew took on, and following her time with NASA, Dr. Jemison became active in her own science and technology for social change consulting company. She also became an instructor in environmental studies at Dartmouth College. Through The Dorothy Jemison Foundation for Excellence, she started an international science and technology camp, "The Earth We Share," that encourages middle school students to consider the impacts STEM subjects have on society while building their skills in science, mathematics and technology. Campers come from all over the world, including Scandinavia, Africa, Europe, the Caribbean and throughout the United States. Currently, she's still an ambassador for science and space: According to the National Women's History Museum, she now heads the 100 Year Starship Project, focused on getting humans to the nearest star. That "Star Trek" Moment and More During the original "Star Trek" TV series, audiences were presented with a more diverse cast than was apparent in society at the time. In the '60s, it wasn't common to see this diversity represented on screen and working together in equality — it was a revelation. This was creator Gene Roddenberry's intention, and his multicultural casting has been described as groundbreaking. Lieutenant Uhura, played by actor Nichelle Nichols, is one of the key characters in the original series. The Washington Post described how, after the first series, she was thinking of leaving the show. However, she was persuaded otherwise by Dr. Martin Luther King Jr., who told her she needed to stay as a role model for other people of color. It's quite fitting, therefore, that, as the first Black woman astronaut, Dr. Jemison frequently referenced "Star Trek" and Lieutenant Uhura during her space mission aboard STS-47 Spacelab-J. According to Energy.gov, Dr. Jemison would use Uhura's communications call sign, "hailing frequencies open," each time she began a shift. In 1993, "Star Trek" repaid the compliment, and Dr. Jemison, as Lieutenant Palmer, appeared on the show. Dr. Jemison has made history already but continues to make incredible advancements in both society and space, the true final frontier.  Interested in all things in outer space and exploration? We are, too. Take a look at open positions at Northrop Grumman and consider joining our team.

Dr. Mae C. Jemison: Making Space History Yesterday, Today and Tomorrow

 In late 1919, a young American woman arrived in Paris, seeking opportunities she was not allowed to pursue at home. Her name was Bessie Coleman, and she wanted to learn how to fly. Her gender was a barrier to achieving her dreams, but not an absolute one. In the years after World War I, women were making a place for themselves in many new fields, and aviation was one of them. But Coleman was black and a woman during a time where the Jim Crow laws were in effect in the southern states, and no American flying school would allow her to enroll because of her race and gender. From Sharecropping to the Sky Born in 1892 to a family of Texas sharecroppers of mixed African-American and Native American background, Coleman showed an early determination, as she put it, to "amount to something." After eight years of one-room school and a semester at Langston University in Oklahoma, she joined her two brothers in Chicago in 1915 and found work as a hairdresser and manager of a chili parlor. Her brothers both served in World War I, and after they returned, one of them remarked to Bessie that French women could do something she would never be able to do: fly. But "never" was not a word in Bessie's vocabulary. She enrolled in French classes, and enlisted supporters in Chicago's small but growing African-American business community to raise the money she needed to go to France and take flying lessons. The art of flying instruction, like aviation itself, was still in its infancy and, as PBS reports, her flight-school experiences included seeing the fatal crash of another student. Though the crash was, in her own words, a "terrible shock," she kept at it, and in June 1921, she earned her pilot's license from the Fé©dé©ration Aé©ronautique Internationale. "Aviatrix" and Barnstormer Coleman came back to the United States in 1921 to find that she was now something of a celebrity. According to Heavy.com, the Air Service News hailed her, in the language of the time, as "a full-fledged aviatrix, the first of her race." But the only way for anyone to fly for a living in that era was as a barnstorming stunt pilot, and Coleman returned to Paris for further advanced training. A year later, in September of 1922, she made her first appearance at an airshow. She had a gift for showmanship along with her flying skills, and for the next four years she was a popular figure in the air-show circuit, known as Queen Bess. But she did not forget where she had come from, and refused to perform at segregated air shows. Everyone who attended, she insisted, had to come in through the same gates. Offered a part in a film, "Shadow and Sunshine," she turned it down because she felt that the role, which had the character dressed in rags at one point, perpetuated stereotypes about African-Americans. Sadly, like so many pilots of the barnstorming era, she died in an accident. On April 30, 1926, she went up to rehearse for an airshow. Her mechanic, William Wills, was at the controls, and Coleman left her seat belt unfastened because she would later be making a parachute jump. Something went wrong. The plane went out of control, and Bessie Coleman was thrown from the cockpit and killed. She was 34 years old. Wills was also killed when the plane crashed; examination of the wreckage indicated that a loose wrench got jammed in the controls. Some 15,000 people attended her funeral. More enduring tributes followed. The Bessie Coleman Aero Club, established in Los Angeles in 1929, fulfilled her dream of a flying school for African-Americans, and according to the National Aviation Hall of Fame, it played a large part in training the first generation of black pilots. For years, African-American pilots in Chicago made an annual fly-over of her grave, Many years later, in 1977, the Bessie Coleman Aviators Club was founded by a group of African-American woman pilots, and in 1995, the Postal Service issued a commemorative stamp in her honor. Nearly a century later, her contributions to flight continue to be remembered.

Bessie Coleman and the Open Sky

Just like the ever-expanding universe, women in space are stretching boundaries. They are making scientific discoveries and inspiring future generations to explore the unknown. Let's take a closer look at some of NASA's most famous female astronauts and their achievements.1. Sally RideA physicist, educator and, famously, the first American woman in space, Sally Ride is an icon. In June 1983, she rode the Challenger shuttle for Mission STS-7. She worked on a robotic arm that delivered satellites to space. Back on Earth, Ride pursued efforts to include more girls in math and science and ushered in the next generation of women in space.2. Kathryn SullivanKathryn Sullivan completed the first spacewalk by an American woman in 1984. Nearly 40 years ago, the Challenger carried Sullivan, an Earth scientist, into space for NASA's STS-41G mission. With Sally Ride as her crewmate, the duo made history, as it was the first time a space crew included two women.3. Mae JemisonMae Jemison was the first African American woman in space. In 1992, she rode Endeavor for the STS-47 mission Spacelab-J, a cooperative mission between the United States and Japan. The eight-day flight involved microgravity investigations in materials and life sciences.In the years since, she has taught at universities, continued a medical career and advocated for diversity and inclusion in STEM fields. Jemison recently told CBS News, "We need to take advantage of the full range of talent."4. Shannon LucidShannon Lucid was the first American woman to live in space and complete a long-duration mission. She was also the first woman to receive the Congressional Space Medal of Honor. In March 1996, she rode the shuttle Atlantis to the Russian Space Station Mir, joining the mission STS-76. Her four-and-a-half-month stay on the space station initiated a continuous U.S. presence in space for the next two years.She later returned to the space station and contributed to life sciences and microgravity research. She participated in five orbiter missions, spent more than 223 days in flight and spent more than three decades at NASA.5. Eileen CollinsEileen Collins is famous for setting many records during her illustrious career. In 1995, she was the first woman pilot of a space shuttle mission (STS-63). Two years later, she was the first woman shuttle pilot to dock with a space station (STS-84 at Mir).Collins was also the first female shuttle commander in 1999, as part of the STS-93 mission. She commanded a historic shuttle mission to the International Space Station in 2005 — the STS-114 mission was the first Return to Flight mission after the tragic loss of Columbia in 2003.6. Peggy WhitsonPeggy Whitson has spent more time in space than any other American or any other woman, according to Space.com. She was the first woman to command the space station twice and the first woman and non-military head of NASA's astronaut office. Even after she retired from NASA in 2018, Whitson continued to break barriers as she became the first woman to command a private space mission (Axiom Space).7. Ellen OchoaEllen Ochoa became the first Hispanic woman in space in 1993. She was a mission specialist aboard the STS-56 flight of Discovery, a nine-day mission that collected data about how the sun's energy affects the ozone layer.Her career included four missions, during which she served as flight engineer, robotic arm operator and the lead for science experiments. Ochoa spent nearly 1,000 hours in space, and her accomplishments continue on the ground. She was the first Latina to hold the prestigious position of director of the Johnson Space Center.8. Christina KochChristina Koch completed the longest single mission by a woman. On the 59th expedition to the International Space Station, Koch was in space for 328 days, starting in 2019 and ending in 2020. Koch and the Expedition-59 crew observed bioengineered devices, tested free-flying robotic assistants and set up external science facilities.9. Jessica MeirJessica Meir is a biologist who studies animals in extreme environments ranging from the ocean to outer space. In 2020, Meir and Koch completed the first all-female spacewalk. Her time on the International Space Station represents the most prolonged continuous female presence aboard the space station. NASA reports that she has spent 205 days in space, 3,280 orbits of Earth and a trip of 86.9 million miles.All these famous female astronauts contributed to scientific discoveries and fundamental exploration. They were the first women in space but certainly not the last. Their legacies continue to inspire future space explorers. And NASA aims to land the first woman and person of color on the moon on the upcoming Artemis missions.Interested in all things in outer space and exploration? We are, too. Learn more about our people and life at Northrop Grumman, or check out our career opportunities to see how you can be a part of defining possible.

9 Notable Women in Space

 Who is Barbara Cartland? A quick Google search turns up the obvious result: Mary Barbara Hamilton Cartland (later honored as Dame Cartland) was one of the most prolific romance novel writers in history, with more than 700 published books. As noted by the New York Times, she regularly churned out 23 novels every year. No surprise, then, that she appeared more than once in the Guiness Book of Records as the world's best-selling author, and her works have been translated into 36 languages.  If that were the whole story, it would certainly be enough for literary enthusiasts and those curious about the sheer speed of potential prose production. But there's another side to Dame Cartland: She was a daredevil who pushed the high-society fad of glider planes to their limits — and shares at least some credit for the Allied victory on D-Day.  Curious? Here's the real story of the romance novelist-turned-innovator.    High Society  Born in July 1901 to Mary Hamilton Scobell and her husband Major Bertram "Bertie" Cartland of the British Army, Barbara Cartland began her life firmly in middle-class comfort. The death of her grandfather and father in short order, however, forced her mother to find a new home for the family and open her own business — a London dress shop — to cover expenses. Cartland's two younger brothers were killed in battle in 1940, while she gained success first as a society reporter and then as a romance novelist. Her work followed a consistent theme: innocent young virgins meeting handsome and entirely honorable men, getting married and enjoying chaste romantic encounters — Cartland herself was said to dislike physical contact and eschewed common vices such as smoking and drinking.  Despite the relatively tame nature of her subject matter, however, her novels remained risqué© for the time and were effectively pulp fiction, especially given the rate at which she churned them out — always dictated to aides, never written by hand or on a typewriter. And while her written work paved the way for financial success, she also earned popular acclaim for her sense of style and contributions as a welfare officer during World War II, eventually securing a place in the Order of the British Empire. Cartland died in May 2000 at the age of 98.  Taking Off  The description above paints a clear picture of Cartland: society woman facing the challenges of family hardship and creating a lucrative career that paved the way for a lasting role in British celebrity life. But there's another side to Barbara Cartland, one with her feet off the ground and her head in the clouds. She was a daredevil, obsessed with the high-society sport of gliding. As noted by io9, gliders became popular among the upper class during the 1920s and 1930s, and Cartland was an accomplished pilot. Gliders occupy an odd space in aeronautics: They're what you get when you take a plane and remove their ability to independently sustain flight. Instead, gliders are towed by powered aircraft and then let go for short-haul flights.   Enable targeting cookies to view this content.  But this wasn't enough for Cartland. She arranged for the first long-distance (200-mile) tow and, along with two Royal Air Force officers, designed the first aircraft-towed airmail delivery glider. During World War II, the Allies expanded on her idea, using powered aircraft to tow troop-carrying gliders near their destination and then cutting them loose. Skilled pilots were able to land these gliders with almost pinpoint accuracy, meaning units could quickly get to work rather than collecting members and equipment after parachute-based drops. In addition, troop gliders were virtually silent, making them difficult to detect in flight. Early success led to gliders as key troop transports during D-Day, and though Cartland wouldn't have said so herself, her contribution was considered critical to Allied success at Normandy. Today, a thriving tow-and-glider plane culture exists, informed in large part by Cartland's work in the early 1930s.  Dame Barbara Cartland doesn't seem like an innovator at first glance but, just like radio-guidance developer Hedy Lamarr, makes it clear that creativity is an unpredictable force — romance novelists and glider revolutionaries aren't so very far apart as one might initially think.

Barbara Cartland: Romance Novelist, Glider Revolutionary?

 Frequency hopping, a Hedy Lamarr invention, paved the way for Wi-Fi, Bluetooth and more, but she is better known as a beautiful actress. During her film career in the 1930s and 1940s she starred alongside the likes of Clark Gable, Spencer Tracy, Judy Garland and Lana Turner. Frequently typecast as a temptress, Lamarr grew bored with the uncomplicated roles, so when she wasn't on set, she challenged herself by inventing new traffic signals and improving tissue box designs. She was a "maker" ahead of her time.Hedy Lamarr: Self-Taught Inventor Born Hedwig Eva Maria Kiesler to a non-practicing Jewish family in Austria in 1914, she married an Austrian weapons manufacturer when she was still a teenager with a budding acting career. He was 14 years older than her, and known for being controlling and possessive. She frequently accompanied her husband at business meetings where fascists and Nazis discussed military technology such as remote-controlled weapons. While hosting extravagant parties that were attended by Mussolini, Hitler and their associates, Lamarr heard the men discussing how they would detect and jam the radio signals that American aircraft and weapons used to communicate. Years later, Lamarr used this dinner party intelligence as the foundation for a secret communication system to help defeat the Nazis in World War II. After divorcing her first husband and moving to the United States to pursue acting, she invented frequency hopping encryption, a radio-guidance system for torpedoes that prevented jamming and detection. Lamarr partnered with composer George Antheil to develop a method that used a piano roll to switch between 88 frequencies. While conventional communication could easily be intercepted, frequency hopping makes jamming much harder, because both the transmitter and receiver "hop" to different frequencies. Since the sequence of frequencies is known by the transmitter and receiver ahead of time, it would seem random to any eavesdroppers. In 1942, she and Antheil were granted a patent for their invention. The patent explains: "Briefly, our system as adapted for radio control of a remote craft, employs a pair of synchronous records, one at the transmitting station and one at the receiving station, which change the tuning of the transmitting and receiving apparatus from time to time, so that without knowledge of the records an enemy would be unable to determine at what frequency a controlling impulse would be sent."The Fate of Frequency Hopping Lamarr's goal was to contribute to the war effort, but the Navy didn't take her piano-based invention seriously at the time. Instead, they advised her to focus her efforts on using her fame to sell war bonds (which she did — quite successfully). Two decades later, the Navy debuted a similar frequency hopping device during the Cuban Missile Crisis. Frequency hopping devices are still used by today's governments. Although the technology was originally designed for military use, frequency hopping led to the commercialization of the electromagnetic spectrum. Lamarr never profited from her invention because her patent expired decades before wireless communication proliferated. Her idea is the foundation for today's wireless communication such as Wi-Fi, Bluetooth and CDMA (code division multiple access) communications. In fact, frequency-hopping spread spectrum transmission will be even more important in the future, as demand for wireless communication increases and the electromagnetic spectrum remains finite. The technique prevents intentional jamming, but it also helps minimize any unintentional interference caused by an overcrowded spectrum. Radios that integrate all radio-frequency functions will be essential for wireless communication. Now that nearly any device can be connected to the internet, jamming and wireless hacking are a looming concern. Electronic warfare — the use of the electromagnetic spectrum or directed energy to control the spectrum — could be the next military crisis. This could range from hacking and cyberattacks to high-power microwave attacks. To prepare, Northrop Grumman is developing solutions such as SIGINT (signals intelligence), which involves gathering intelligence by intercepting electronic signals. Now that radar techniques have improved, even stealth aircraft can be detected, and radar frequencies will be overcome by serious competitors. Air survivability in these situations will have to come from other approaches, such as electronic defense against incoming missiles. Pilots will have to learn to trust people who are not in the raid with them to perform mission-critical functions from remote desktops. Today and in the future, popular consumer gadgets as well as defense technology will continue to depend on this Hedy Lamarr invention. Although she didn't receive the recognition she deserved for her innovations in techology in her lifetime, Hedy Lamarr was inducted to the National Inventors Hall of Fame in 2014.

Not Just a Movie Star: Wi-Fi, Bluetooth Go Back to Hedy Lamarr Invention

We've all likely heard the saying at one point or another: "The future is female." But as enterprises and educational institutions look forward by ramping up efforts to encourage STEM accessibility and recruit women scientists, they often miss the impact of the past. Case in point? Chemist Mary Elliott Hill. One of the first African American women to become a chemist — and likely the first to receive a master's degree — this female trailblazer both advanced the cause of science and helped to encourage other young women to pursue STEM careers. However, chances are you've never heard her story. So, here is a look at the remarkable life and work of Mary Elliott Hill. A Brief History of Mary Elliot Hill Born in 1907 in the segregated town of South Mills, North Carolina to Frances Bass and Robert Elliott, Mary Elliott Hill didn't have the easiest path into physical science. But persistence paid off: In 1925, she began attending what is now Virginia State University (VSU), and in 1929, she earned her bachelor's degree in chemistry. Along the way, she met and married fellow chemist Carl McClellan Hill, and by 1930 she was teaching at VSU's Laboratory High School. Then, 1937 saw her becoming a full-time faculty member at the Hampton Institute, and after taking graduate classes during the summer at the University of Pennsylvania, Hill became the first female chemist to earn her master's degree in 1941. From 1944 to 1962, she was a chemistry professor at Tennessee A&I State College. In 1962, she moved with her husband to Frankfort, Kentucky, where he was appointed president of Kentucky State University and she worked as a professor. The pair teamed up to work on multiple projects over the years — her analytical work in ultraviolet spectophotometry helped to develop methods that allowed for more precise tracking of progress in chemical reactions. Keen on Ketenes Hill specialized in two branches of chemistry: organic and analytical. Organic chemistry focuses on the study of molecules and compounds that make up life — such as carbon, hydrogen, oxygen and nitrogen. It explores how these molecules interact and what new molecules can be created. Meanwhile, analytical chemistry looks to identify and quantify materials in a mixture, both by adapting existing process and creating new methodologies for new compounds. Hill's expertise in both disciplines drove her work on ketenes. These are colorless and toxic gasses made of two carbon molecules and one oxygen, along with two other molecules from monovalent chemical groups. They are also soluble in nearly all organic solvents. The most common ketene is ethenone, which sees two hydrogen molecules attached to the carbon and oxygen. Work with ketenes isn't easy; they're described as a having a "penetrating" odor and are highly reactive and unstable. As a result, ketene research during Hill's time was limited by challenges in accurately tracking reaction progress and measuring its impact. However, her expertise in analytical chemistry made it possible for the Hill to determine the solubility of components in non-aqueous solutions, in turn improving their ability to identify and quantify products. This work helped to underpin the development of ketene polymerization, which is instrumental in the synthesis and production of plastics. Leadership Beyond the Lab While Hill's work in developing ketene analysis via ultraviolet spectophotometry helped to set the stage for further scientific development, she was also a female trailblazer outside the lab. To help encourage other African American women to pursue STEM careers, she created student chapters of the American Chemical Societies at multiple schools where she taught; her work as both a mentor and professor helped more than 20 of her students find careers in chemistry. In addition, she was a member of the Alpha Cappa Alpha National Honor Society, the Tennessee Academy of Science and the National Institute of Science. Hill also wrote several textbooks with her husband and co-authored more than 40 scientific papers, but despite her expertise and experience, she was never listed as the senior author. She noted that during her time as a professor and researcher, more women were becoming interested in STEM careers and the role of the female chemist, but many chose other options when it became clear that research environments remained largely out of reach. Hill passed away in 1969, having blazed a trail as a chemist, leader and scientific innovator. Action and Reaction Chemists continue to push the envelope of what's possible, what's probable and what has untapped potential. For example, researchers at Martin Luther University Halle-Wittneberg (MLU) have created a set of new and inexpensive catalysts capable of taking the place of those based on gold or platinum to facilitate alkyne reactions. Meanwhile, work from the University of Buffalo has uncovered a way to transform sugar into hydrocarbons, which could help power the cars of the future. But this kind of scientific status quo shattering wouldn't be possible without the hard work of female chemists and trailblazers like Mary Elliott Hill. Put simply? To get where we're going, we need to know where we've been — and who helped us get here along the way. Check out Northrop Grumman career opportunities to see how you can participate in this fascinating time of discovery in science, technology, and engineering.

Precipitating Potential: Female Trailblazer Mary Elliott Hill

Florence Nightingale, the founder of modern nursing, was born in 1820 to a wealthy British family. Determined to help the sick, Nightingale cared for the poor and infirm in the village surrounding her family's estate. She later enrolled in a nursing school in Germany, much to the consternation of her parents. The Science Museum, London noted that while her mother and father greatly encouraged her education, especially her affinity for statistics, they disapproved of nursing, an unsuitable career for a young woman of wealth and stature. This did not dissuade Nightingale, who History.com describes as one of the most famous nurses of all time. On May 12 — International Nurses Day — we celebrate Florence Nightingale. The Founder of Modern Nursing Nightingale started her career at a Middlesex hospital for ailing governesses in the midst of a cholera outbreak. By improving hygienic conditions in the hospital, Nightingale dramatically reduced the mortality rate. Secretary of War Sidney Herbert, who had heard of Nightingale's new hygiene practices, asked her to come to Crimea, where the situation was dire. Employing her aptitude for statistics, according to the Smithsonian, she discovered that more soldiers were dying from infectious diseases than from battle wounds — in short, bad hygiene. At Scutari, the British hospital in Constantinople, Nightingale scrubbed everything from the floors to the ceilings, enlisting the help of the least sick patients. She set up a kitchen, a library and a laundry room so her patients could have clean linens, entertainment and warm food. Nightingale was known for walking down the hallways at night, lamp in hand, as she tended to patients. Ultimately, the International Council of Nurses reported that Nightingale's efforts reduced death rate at the military hospitals from 40 percent to 2 percent. How Did Nightingale Gain Fame? When Nightingale returned home to England, Queen Victoria awarded her an engraved brooch and $250,000, which she used to start a training school for nurses, according to History.com.  At 38 years old, Nightingale worked mostly from her bed due to chronic health issues developed in Crimea. Still, she pushed for health care reform across Europe and reportedly met with most visitors in her bedroom.  By the time she died at age 90, the International Council of Nurses noted that Nightingale had authored more than 200 reports detailing how to manage hospital conditions, proper hygiene and more. What Was Nightingale's Legacy? "The Lady With the Lamp" is considered the founder of modern nursing because of her innovative approach to the field. By focusing on personalized patient care — like good hygiene — recovery was more likely. The holistic approach she advocated, considered revolutionary at the time, is still implemented today.  A lifelong devotee of mathematics, she also became the first female member of the Royal Statistical Society because of her prolific statistical contributions to the war effort. The International Council of Nurses considers Nightingale extremely influential in passing public policy and health care reforms. Modern nurses still look to Nightingale as a role model. A Day to Celebrate International Nurses Day is celebrated on May 12 every year, Florence Nightingale's own birthday. This year, take a moment to celebrate the nurses around us. Most nurses work long shifts and take on dirty and emotionally exhausting tasks without batting an eye. Many are everyday heroes, just like Nightingale.

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