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Atomic women

Nature Chemistry volume 10, pages 373–375 (2018)Cite this article

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To appreciate women’s contribution to science, Michelle Francl suggests it’s time to stop talking about the most famous one.

Marie Curie is not just the iconic image of a woman scientist, she is the only woman scientist many people can name. In 2014, geologists Cynthia Burek and Bettie Higgs presented the results of a preliminary survey on the public perception of women scientists3. Their work suggested there is no public perception of women scientists, plural. There is only Marie. When asked to list the names of ten women scientists in five minutes, almost one in five respondents can’t provide a single name. Of the ones that can? Three-quarters name Marie Curie, many only Marie Curie. A scant 1.2% could name ten women scientists, living or dead. (Grab a piece of paper and try it, you can’t ask or name colleagues, collaborators or family members, or use Google).

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Fig. 1: A photograph taken at the 4th Annual Washington Conference on Theoretical Physics in 1938 at George Washington University.

George Washington University14

Fig. 2: A 1921 photograph taken at a party for James Franck (seated on the sofa in the centre) on the occasion of his moving from the Kaiser Wilhelm Institute in Berlin to the University of Göttingen.

American Institute of Physics Emilio Segrè Visual Archives, Aristid V. Grosse Collection

Fig. 3

Photograph by Paul Ehrenfest Jr courtesy of the American Institute of Physics Emilio Segrè Visual Archives, Weisskopf Collection

References

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  2. https://twitter.com/curiouswavefn/status/945394251248095232

  3. Burek, C. & Higgs, B. Public Perception of Female Scientists (University of Chichester, University of Cork, 2014); https://womeninscience.net/?page_id=675#Perception

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  1. Twitter: @michellefrancl

Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Chemistry at Bryn Mawr College, Bryn Mawr, PA, USA

    Michelle Francl

  2. Vatican Observatory, Vatican City, Vatican City

    Michelle Francl

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Correspondence to Michelle Francl.

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Francl, M. Atomic women. Nature Chem 10, 373–375 (2018). https://doi.org/10.1038/s41557-018-0038-3

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