Women Science Pioneers

Maren Nattermann, Research Group Leader at the Max Planck Institute for Terrestrial Microbiology, on Marjory Stephenson (1885–1948): pioneer of chemical microbiology, whose work on bacterial metabolic physiology established the field as an independent discipline more

Nadine Neumayer, head of the Lise Meitner Research Group Galactic Nuclei at the Max Planck Institute for Astronomy in Heidelberg, reflects on the pioneering work of U.S. astronomer Vera Rubin, a trailblazer in the discovery of dark matter more

Suropriya Saha from the Max Planck Institute of Dynamics and Self-Organization in Göttingen, about the theoretical physicist Maria Goeppert Mayer, who won the Physics Nobel Prize in 1963 more

Mercedes Gomez de Agüero, junior group leader at the Max Planck Research Group for Systems Immunology, about pioneering bacteriologist Anna Wessels Williams   more

Neha Bathia, postdoctoral researcher at the Max Planck Institute for Plant Breeding Research, about the trailblazing Indian botanist Janaki Ammal, one of the first female botanists in India. more

Flore Kunst, Research Group Leader at the Max Planck Institute for the Science of Light in Erlangen, about the pioneering feminist and women’s suffrage activist Aletta Jacobs, the first female doctor in the Netherlands and a leading figure in the Dutch and international women's movement
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Franciele Kruczkiewicz from the Max Planck Institute for Extraterrestrial Physics about Cecilia Payne-Gaposchkin more

Eleni Dovrou from the Max Planck Institute for Chemistry, about 19th century amateur scientist and women's campaigner Eunice Newton Foote more

Noémie Combe, Max Planck Institute for the Mathematics of Sciences, about the brilliant mathematician Emmy Noether, regarded as the inventor of modern algebra more

Jana Wäldchen of the Max Planck Institute of Biochemistry on the British biodiversity researcher and conservation biologist Georgina Mace more

Florencia Campetella, Max Planck Institute for Chemical Ecology, on Sybilla Maria Merian, 17th century entomologist, artist, naturalist, proto-ecologist more

Natalie Matosin from the Max Planck Institute of Psychiatry in Munich talks about the biochemist Rosalind Franklin more

Franziska Turck from the Max Planck Institute for Plant Breeding Research talks about the botanist and Nazi opponent Elisabeth Schiemann more

Astronomer Sherry Suyu from the Max Planck Institute for Astrophysics on comet-hunter Caroline Herschel, the first salaried female astronomer more

Mathematician Anna Siffert from the Max Planck Institute for Mathematics on why Ada Lovelace is considered the world's first computer programmer. more

Annette Vogt from the Max Planck Institute for the History of Science on Sofia Kovalevskaya, the world's first female professor of mathematics. more