The International Day of Women and Girls in Science was established in 2015, by the United Nations General Assembly, to encourage access to girls and women in science and technology.

Girls and women still struggle with social and structural barriers to entering science, technology, engineering, and math (STEM) fields. For this reason, it is important to create conditions so that girls and women feel encouraged to pursue their scientific studies and careers.

To celebrate the female presence in science, we highlight some of the many women who have contributed to scientific advances around the world at different times in history.

 

Michiyo Tsujimura

The Japanese scientist was born in 1888 and was responsible for the research that identified the benefits of green tea for health.

Dr. Tsujimura devoted herself to studying Chemistry and Nutrition in Agriculture, and her method of extracting vitamin C crystals from plants is employed all over the world. She was the first woman in Japan to obtain a PhD in Agriculture, in 1932.

 

Vera Rubin

Astronomer Vera Rubin was born in 1928 in the United States and began studying galaxies in the early 1960s.

With a master’s degree from Cornell University and a PhD from Georgetown University, Dr. Rubin studied the Andromeda galaxy and others and confirmed the existence of dark matter with her research partner.

Dark matter influences the motion of stars with its gravitational force and is estimated to make up 23% of the universe.

 

Jaqueline Goes de Jesus and Ester Sabino

In 2020, Brazilian scientists Jaqueline and Ester were leading figures in sequencing the genome of COVID-19 in Brazil within 48 hours after confirmation of the first infected patient in the country.

With a PhD in Immunology from the University of São Paulo (USP), Dr. Ester Sabino is a physician and an Associate Professor in the Infectious and Parasitic Diseases Department at the Medicine School of USP. She was also the director of the Institute of Tropical Medicine (IMT) at USP.

Dr. Jaqueline Goes de Jesus is a Biomedical and holds a PhD in Human and Experimental Pathology from the Federal University of Bahia (UFBA). Currently, she is a post-doctoral fellow at USP’s IMT.

 

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