Women in STEM

She Was Tracking Post-Roe Abortions. The Trump Administration Just Pulled Her Funding.

Diana Greene Foster is responsible for landmark research on the effects of abortion access—a massive 10-year study that tracked thousands of people who had an abortion or were denied one. But funding for a follow-up to her seminal Turnaway Study has just been cut as part of a wave of canceled health policy research. 

Foster received a MacArthur “genius grant” for the Turnaway Study. That piece of research, which examined the impact of restrictions even before the fall of Roe v. Wade, helped shape public understanding of how abortion access can affect people’s health and economic well-being by finding that people who were denied abortions were more likely to experience years of poverty compared to those who could terminate their unplanned pregnancies.

‘It Takes a Village’—But What If You Don’t Have One?

Front & Center began as first-person accounts of Black mothers in Jackson, Miss., receiving a guaranteed income. Now in its fourth year, the series is expanding to explore broader systemic issues affecting Black women in poverty, including the safety net, healthcare, caregiving and overall well-being.

“I’m part of the Magnolia Mother’s Trust this year, so that money will help me offset the lost income of going back to school part time. It was a revelation to be able to cover multiple things in one day that I would’ve had to space out for weeks before. I bought diapers, paid my car note and the light bill. That feeling of being able to take care of things has relieved a lot of stress. Before, it was so hard. I would cry in the shower so my kids wouldn’t hear me.

“I didn’t have paid leave for the first four weeks after DeMarcus was born. … That experience really opened my eyes to how important it is to have better family leave policies in this country. It is not enough to just offer a few weeks of leave. We need to support mothers’ mental health as well. Pregnancy care is focused on prenatal care, but there needs to be more mental health support. I went through postpartum depression myself, and it was so bad that I didn’t want anyone to see my baby. It takes a village to raise a child, but not everyone has that village.”

Scientists Understood Physics of Climate Change in the 1800s—Thanks to a Woman Named Eunice Foote

Long before the current political divide over climate change, and even before the U.S. Civil War (1861-1865), an American scientist named Eunice Foote documented the underlying cause of today’s climate change crisis.

The year was 1856. Foote’s brief scientific paper was the first to describe the extraordinary power of carbon dioxide gas to absorb heat—the driving force of global warming.

Caroline Herschel Was England’s First Female Professional Astronomer, but Still Lacks Name Recognition Two Centuries Later

Most people today haven’t heard of Caroline Herschel, the first English professional female astronomer. Despite having several astronomical objects—and even a satellite—named after her, she doesn’t have the same name recognition as the other astronomers of her time. Her story reflects not only the priorities of astronomy but also how credit is assigned in the field.

Emmy Noether Faced Sexism and Anti-Semitism. Over 100 Years Later, Her Contributions to Ring Theory Still Influence Modern Math

When Albert Einstein wrote an obituary for Emmy Noether in 1935, he described her as a “creative mathematical genius” who—despite “unselfish, significant work over a period of many years”—did not get the recognition she deserved.

Noether made groundbreaking contributions to mathematics at a time when women were barred from academia and when Jewish people like herself faced persecution in Nazi Germany, where she lived.

A Young Black Scientist Discovered a Pivotal Leprosy Treatment in the 1920s. An Older White Male Colleague Took the Credit.

Hansen’s disease, also called leprosy, is treatable today—and that’s partly thanks to a curious tree and the work of a pioneering young scientist Alice Ball in the 1920s. She laid fundamental groundwork for the first effective leprosy treatment globally. But her legacy still prompts conversations about the marginalization of women and people of color in science today.

Women’s History Month: Five Groundbreaking Researchers Who Mapped the Ocean Floor, Tested Atomic Theories, Vanquished Malaria and More

Behind some of the most fascinating scientific discoveries and innovations are women whose names might not be familiar but whose stories are worth knowing:

—Marie Tharp revolutionized oceanography by mapping the seafloor, uncovering a rift valley that helped prove plate tectonic theory.
—Margaret Morse Nice transformed ornithology with her empathetic study of song sparrows, pioneering methods still used today.
—Tu Youyou led groundbreaking research in Maoist China, extracting artemisinin from traditional medicine, which became a lifesaving malaria treatment.
—Emmy Noether, a mathematical genius praised by Einstein, overcame systemic barriers to make foundational contributions to theoretical physics.
—Chien-Shiung Wu, an atomic physicist, played a critical role in the Manhattan Project and experimentally disproved a long-standing nuclear theory … though her male colleagues received the Nobel Prize for the discovery.

Physicians Sound the Alarm: The Data Is Gone, But the Need Isn’t

The Trump administration has erased thousands of pages of public health data from government websites—information doctors rely on and taxpayers funded.

“They took down information that healthcare providers use on a daily basis to make sure you’re safe, to prevent the spread of disease,” said Dr. Sophia Yen, medical director and co-founder of Pandia Health. “You just can’t play with people’s lives. You can’t play with people’s health.”