By Lilli Drueckler
These incredible women were not credited for their discoveries, had their credit stolen or were not credited until many years later. This was just on the basis that previously women did not have a place in the scientific world. These pioneers deserve more than just an article.
Hedy Lamarr
Hedy Lamarr is mostly historically credited with acting and her title of, “most beautiful woman in the world,” but today in the modern world she can be given her credit towards to her contribution to the development of Bluetooth technology. When Lamarr first pioneered frequency hopping, it was dismissed in the media which could not correlate her brains with her beauty. There was such little news coverage that the only legacy remaining was her acting career. But today, we can look at how she made a significant physics discovery that was used in World War 2 for communication and in most modern technology today. The discovery of frequency hopping allowed radio transmissions to not have interference or interceptions because the carrier frequency is repeatedly switched between available narrowband frequencies within a specific broad channel. The same concept was adapted for Bluetooth, and all wireless technology, as it fixed the entire problem of interference. I feel personally connected to Hedy Lamarr getting credit, as currently in my Applied Science course we learn about how frequency hopping works, only thanks to her and many other scientists.
“Films have a certain place in a certain time. Technology is forever.”
Rosalind Elsie Franklin
Rosalind Elsie Franklin’s contribution of the discovery of DNA structures was unrecognized during her lifetime and most of the credit went to her male coworkers. Today she is seen as a “forgotten heroine.” She joined other scientists in the Medical Research Unit at King’s College where we can credit her for pioneering the density of DNA and she contributed to the discovery of molecular structure of DNA and viruses. This is one of the most important discoveries in Biology and Medicine. The discovery of the structure of DNA is the foundation of all medical discoveries and her work can be linked to saving millions of people.
“In my view, all that is necessary for faith is the belief that by doing our best we shall succeed in our aims; the improvement of mankind.”
Chien-Shiung Wu
Labelled by PSB News as the “First Lady of Physics,” Chien-Shiung Wu’s work was discarded and hidden for over seven decades. However, in 2022 she finally got recognition after the award of a Noble Prize. She proved Enrico’s Theory of Beta Decay which many tried to solve for decades without success as well as proving Wheeler’s Pair Theory. Her work was done with such accuracy and skill in physics. In one of her findings published in 1950, Chien-Shiung Wu found a property of entangled particles that always correlate; she was the first to document entanglement. She was also the first to document entangled photons and was not mentioned in the Noble Prize which was credited to three different physicists. She also played a part in making the atomic bomb, gaseous diffusion, concepts of particle physics, and conducted the Wu experiment which proved that parity is not conserved. The discovery of the Wu experiment resulted in her colleagues Tsung-Dao Lee and Chen-Ning Yang winning the 1957 Noble Prize for Physics.
“It is shameful that there are so few women in science. In China there are many, many women in physics. There is a misconception in America that women scientists are all dowdy spinsters. This is the fault of men. In Chinese society, a woman is valued for what she is, and men encourage her to accomplishments, yet she remains eternally feminine.”
