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Natural Science

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Lise Meitner

Lise Meitner’s influential work concerning radioactivity in the early 20th century made her a target of the Nazis. She fled to Sweden in 1938, and it was there that she discovered the power of the fission reaction. Even though Meitner never worked on nuclear weapons, her 1939 research was essential in the research of nuclear power.

Mathilde Krim

Scientist and philanthropist Mathilde Krim made tremendous contributions to AIDS research and fundraising for those affected by the condition. She founded the American Foundation for AIDS Research in 1985 with Elizabeth Taylor and was also instrumental in oncology research and in Israel advocacy.

Frances Krasnow

Frances Krasnow helped bring scientific rigor to dental medicine through her research into oral biochemistry and microorganisms. A graduate of Barnard College, Columbia University, and the Teachers Institute of the Jewish Theological Seminary, Krasnow would eventually receive recognition for being a pioneer in both science and Jewish education.

Gertrud Kornfeld

Gertrud Kornfeld was the first woman scientist to receive an academic appointment at the University of Berlin, having been appointed lecturer in physical chemistry in 1928. After being dismissed in 1933, she eventually made her way to the United States, where she became a researcher for the Kodak Company in New York.

Malka Kolodny

Malka Fisz Kolodny served as one of the first teachers in pre-State Palestine. She taught subjects ranging from basic literacy to chemistry and biology and encouraged, counselled, and supported her students, staying in touch with them for years.

Irene Caroline Diner Koenigsberger

A distinguished chemist credited with discovering the molecular structure of rubber, Irene Caroline Koenigsberger refused to patent her work, making her discovery available to all. She was also an important figure in the Washington, D.C. Jewish community, cofounding Temple Sinai and the B’nai B’rith Hillel at George Washington University.

Helene Khatskels

As a member of the General Jewish Workers’ Bund, Helene Khatskels fought to realize socialist ideals about autonomy and liberation. As a Yiddish teacher and writer in Tsarist Russia and later the Soviet Union, she demonstrated a commitment to spreading and inspiring pride in Yiddish culture.

Joyce Jacobson Kaufman

A pioneer in the field of physical chemistry, Joyce Jacobson Kaufman did groundbreaking work in the fields of jet propulsion fuels used in the space program, psychotropic pharmacology, and drug design. Kaufman also discovered a novel strategy for using computers to predict drug reactions and the trajectory of a significant number of carcinogens.

Clara Immerwahr

The first woman to be awarded a doctorate in physical chemistry at a German university, Clara Immerwahr’s her achievements were long overlooked by male-dominated university circles. Immerwahr committed suicide in protest of her husband’s involvement in the implementation of gas attacks during World War I. Recognized only posthumously, her name has become linked with moral responsibility in science.

Libbie Henrietta Hyman

Libbie Henrietta Hyman spent her career researching and writing the definitive texts on invertebrates, a monumental effort. Hyman transformed her love of the soft creatures to texts that brought her international recognition as an expert on invertebrates and as the world authority on flatworms.

Ida Henrietta Hyde

Ida Henrietta Hyde was a pioneering physiologist in the late nineteenth and early twentieth century. While Hyde was best known for creating a microelectrode that could sample and manipulate individual cells, she was proudest of her work to support other women scientists.

Rahel Hirsch

Physiologist, physician, and teacher Rahel Hirsch worked for nearly two decades at the Medical Clinic of the Berlin Charité, eventually as the head of a polyclinic and a professor. Yet Hirsch was never paid at the Charité; she left in 1919 and opened a private practice. Hirsch emigrated to England in 1938, working as a laboratory assistant and librarian, but she struggled with mental illness and died in a psychiatric hospital in 1953.

Clara Heyn

Botanist Clara Heyn’s most significant achievement was her work with the plant family Leguminosae, especially the genus Medicago. She was an excellent botanist, teacher, and colleague.

Elisabeth Goldschmidt

Elisabeth Goldschmidt was the founder of genetic studies as a research and teaching discipline at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem. She saw in the mass immigration of Jewish communities to Israel a unique opportunity for genetic research that might also contribute to the welfare of society, and in consequence founded the systematic research in human genetics and genetic counseling services in Israel.

Charlotte Friend

Cell biologist and immunologist Charlotte Friend discovered a virus that could transmit leukemia and made major contributions to our understanding of cancer and its causes. She served as director of the Center for Experimental Cell Biology at Mount Sinai Medical School, and later as the president of the New York Academy of Sciences and the American Association for Cancer Research.

Rosalind Elsie Franklin

An influential British physical chemist, Rosalind Elsie Franklin’s essential innovations in DNA research, including her X-ray DNA photography and her work in distinguishing between “A” and “B” forms of DNA, allowed Frances Crick and James Watson to solve the structure of DNA as early as 1953. Her important role in their work went largely unacknowledged until the 1990s.

Naomi Feinbrun-Dothan

Naomi Feinbrun-Dothan helped pioneer the scientific analysis of native Israeli flora and establish the study of botany and genetics at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem.

Gertrude Elion

Gertrude Elion’s biochemistry work revolutionized the ways drugs are developed. She received the Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine even though she never earned her PhD. Her career paved the way for chemotherapy, organ transplantation, anti-viral medications, and AIDS treatment.

Tilly Edinger

Tilly Edinger made her mark as one of the leading vertebrate paleontologists of the twentieth century. Her pioneering work in paleoneurology, the study of fossil brains, established her international reputation as the outstanding woman in her field. She performed research in Germany before World War II and continued researching and teaching in the United States until her untimely death in 1967.

Gerty Theresa Cori

Gerty Cori’s work on carbohydrate metabolism, which changed our understanding of diabetes, earned her the Nobel Prize for Medicine, making her the first American woman given the honor.

Mildred Cohn

Biochemist Mildred Cohn used new technology to measure organic reactions in living cells. She not only breached new frontiers in atomic chemistry, but also did so by breaking through barriers as a woman and a Jew in a male- and Christian-dominated field

Edith Bülbring

German-born scientist Edith Bülbring was renowned for her work in smooth muscle physiology, which paved the way for contemporary cellular investigations. She pursued this work through a large and flourishing large research group at Oxford University, which she led for seventeen years. In 1958 she was elected to the Royal Society.

May Brodbeck

May Brodbeck, whose career in the sciences ran the gamut from teaching high school chemistry to exploring fundamental philosophical questions about the nature of human consciousness, was among the foremost American-born philosophers of science.

Varvara Alexandrovna Brilliant-Lerman

Varvara Brilliant-Lerman was a well-known plant physiologist in Russia, whose main works were devoted to the physiology of photosynthesis. She took advantage of the increased ability of women to have careers in science due to the Bolshevik revolution in 1917, teaching at several institutions in Russia. Brilliant continued teaching and researching until her death in 1954.

Brazil, Contemporary

Brazil is home to the second largest Jewish community in South America. Jewish women played important roles in the absorption of Jewish immigrants from Europe, the Middle East, and North Africa, and also made important contributions to Brazilian intellectual and artistic life.

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