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Lost Women of Science: Daily Summaries Delivered
by Lost Women of Science
For every Marie Curie or Rosalind Franklin whose story has been told, hundreds of female scientists remain unknown to the public at large. In this series, we illuminate the lives and work of a diverse array of groundbreaking scientists who, because of time, place and gender, have gone largely unrecognized. Each season we focus on a different scientist, putting her narrative into context, explaining not just the science but also the social and historical conditions in which she lived and worked. We also bring these stories to the present, painting a full picture of how her work endures.
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- 1 weeks ago42 min
Kamala Sohonie: The Chemist who Wanted to Feed a Nation
In 1930s India, Kamala Baghvat dreamed of working alongside the world's greatest scientific minds. But she was repeatedly told “no” when she tried to work in the then male dominated field. Inspired by Gandhi, she used nonviolent protest to pry her way into some of India’s top laboratories. She became the first Indian woman to earn a PhD in biochemistry, and eventually, the first woman to lead India's Royal Institute of Science. Baghvat’s career centered around a topic she was passionate about: solving India’s malnutrition crisis. Learn about your ad choices: dovetail.prx.org/ad-choices
- 3 weeks ago26 min
Sharla Perrine Boehm: An Overlooked Founder of the Internet
Sharla Perrine Boehm earned a teaching degree from UCLA before channeling her talent for math into computer programming. While working at the Rand Corporation, she built a ground-breaking simulation, originally conceived to strengthen military communications during the Cold War. The simulation –and her work– would ultimately lay the foundation for the modern internet. Learn about your ad choices: dovetail.prx.org/ad-choices
- Apr 30, 202630 min
Best Of: Chemistry Professor and Crime Buster: The Remarkable Life of Mary Louisa Willard
“The only time I ever saw something that I thought was abnormal…there was a human arm in the refrigerator,” said J. Peter Willard about his aunt, Mary Louisa Willard. Otherwise, he insisted, she was “very normal.” But Mary Louisa Willard, a chemistry professor at Pennsylvania State University in the late 1920s, left a strong impression on most people, to say the least. Her hometown of State College, Pennsylvania, knew her for stopping traffic in her pink Cadillac to chat with friends, and for throwing birthday bashes for her beloved cocker spaniels. Police around the world knew her for her side hustle: using chemistry to help solve crimes. Learn about your ad choices: dovetail.prx.org/ad-choices
- Apr 30, 202631 min
Profesora de química y caza criminales: La extraordinaria vida de Mary Louisa Willard
“La única vez que vi algo que me pareció anormal… había un brazo humano en el refrigerador”, dijo J. Peter Willard sobre su tía, Mary Louisa Willard. Por lo demás, insistió, era “muy normal.” Pero Mary Louisa Willard, profesora de química en la Universidad Estatal de Pensilvania a finales de la década de 1920, dejó una fuerte impresión en la mayoría de las personas. Su ciudad natal, State College (Pensilvania), la conocía por detener el tráfico en su Cadillac rosa para saludar a sus amistades, y por organizar fiestas de cumpleaños para sus queridos perritos cocker spaniels. La policía la conocía por su oficio secundario: usar la química para resolver crímenes. Learn about your ad choices: dovetail.prx.org/ad-choices
- Apr 16, 202638 min
Elizabeth Roboz Einstein: The Determined Genius Behind a Multiple Sclerosis Breakthrough
Elizabeth Roboz Einstein’s life was shaped by the forces of history. She studied bioorganic chemistry at the University of Vienna in the 1920s and then left her home country of Hungary during World War II, before German troops invaded — practically a miracle for a single, Jewish woman. In the U.S., she blazed a trail in the brand new field of neurochemistry; her seminal research into multiple sclerosis (MS) unlocked key findings that would make effective medical treatments for MS possible. Learn about your ad choices: dovetail.prx.org/ad-choices
- Apr 2, 202636 min
Conversation: If I Am Right, and I Know I Am: Inge Lehmann, the Woman Who Discovered Earth’s Innermost Secret
In this episode of Lost Women of Science Conversations, host Carol Sutton Lewis speaks with science writer Hanne Strager about her biography of Inge Lehmann, the pioneering Danish seismologist who discovered that Earth has a solid inner core.. Largely unknown outside scientific circles, Lehmann fundamentally transformed our understanding of what lies at the heart of our planet. She did this in 1936 by identifying anomalies in earthquake waves that others had overlooked. At the time, scientists believed Earth’s core was entirely liquid. Lehmann proposed instead that a solid inner core lay hidden within it — a groundbreaking insight that reshaped geophysics.In revisiting Lehmann’s story, Strager highlights that Lehmann’s legacy is one of resilience and perseverance — proof that early setbacks do not define a life, and that brilliance can flourish, even later in life. Learn about your ad choices: dovetail.prx.org/ad-choices
- Mar 19, 202637 min
BONUS: Agnes Pockels and the Kitchen Sink Myth
This bonus episode is a co-production with Distillations, a podcast produced by the Science History Institute.Agnes Pockels did pioneering work in surface science. Her invention, the Pockels Trough, became the basis for an instrument that helped Katherine Burr Blodgett and Irving Langmuir make discoveries in material science that quietly shape our everyday world. But the way we talk about Agnes’s life and work often falls back on familiar tropes about women’s domestic roles, assumptions about how science gets done, and what it looked like to do science as a woman in the 19th century. Agnes's story invites us to rethink how we define success for scientists. Is our definition too narrow? And what might we gain if we crack it open a bit wider? Learn about your ad choices: dovetail.prx.org/ad-choices
- Mar 12, 202637 min
Layers of Brilliance: Vanishing Act -- Episode Six
How is a legacy preserved, and how is someone forgotten? Determined to make a final name for himself, Irving Langmuir ventures into science that even he might classify as pathological wishful thinking, while Katharine continues her work as the diligent experimenter. But her contributions faded from both the company’s and the public’s memory. We go to visit her, to say good-bye – and we look at the wisdom she imparted to the next generation of inquiring minds. Learn about your ad choices: dovetail.prx.org/ad-choices
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About Lost Women of Science
For every Marie Curie or Rosalind Franklin whose story has been told, hundreds of female scientists remain unknown to the public at large. In this series, we illuminate the lives and work of a diverse array of groundbreaking scientists who, because of time, place and gender, have gone largely unrecognized. Each season we focus on a different scientist, putting her narrative into context, explaining not just the science but also the social and historical conditions in which she lived and worked. We also bring these stories to the present, painting a full picture of how her work endures.
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