🧬 Women & Trans Pioneers in STEM – Timeline

• 1843 – Ada Lovelace: Wrote the first computer algorithm for Charles Babbage’s Analytical Engine.
• 1903 & 1911 – Marie Curie: First woman to win a Nobel Prize—and the only person to win in both Physics and Chemistry. Her research on radioactivity paved the way for nuclear medicine.
• 1908 – Henrietta Swan Leavitt: Discovered how a star’s brightness and pulsation correlate, enabling intergalactic distance measurement.
• 1921 – Edith Clarke: First woman professionally employed as an electrical engineer in the U.S.
• 1925 – Cecilia Payne-Gaposchkin: Proved stars are primarily composed of hydrogen and helium—redefining astronomy.
• 1952 – Rosalind Franklin: Captured the critical X-ray diffraction image that led to the discovery of DNA’s double helix structure.
• 1967 – Jocelyn Bell Burnell: Discovered pulsars while still a graduate student—one of the biggest astronomical finds of the 20th century.
• 1969 – Margaret Hamilton: Led the software engineering team for NASA’s Apollo 11. Her code helped land humans on the Moon.
• 1970s – Vera Rubin: Observed galaxy rotation anomalies that provided early evidence for dark matter.
• 1960s–1970s – Dr. Lynn Conway: Computer scientist and electrical engineer who invented dynamic instruction scheduling at IBM and later co-developed VLSI chip design methods at Xerox PARC—cornerstones of modern microprocessor design. A pioneering trans woman who advanced both computing and inclusion in tech.
• 1980s–2010s – Dr. Ben Barres: Transgender neuroscientist who revolutionized glial cell research and advocated for equity in science.
• 1992 – Dr. Mae Jemison: First Black woman in space. Physician, engineer, and inspiration for STEM inclusion.
• 2000s–present – Rachel Levine: Transgender public health leader, pediatrician, and advocate for evidence-based policy.
• 2005 – Limor Fried (Ladyada): Founded Adafruit Industries, championing open-source hardware innovation.
• 2010s – Lucianne Walkowicz: Nonbinary astrophysicist studying stellar magnetism and planetary systems, with strong advocacy for ethics in space science.
• 2010s – Angelica Ross: Trans tech entrepreneur and founder of TransTech, uplifting LGBTQ+ talent in tech.
• 2010s – Dr. Tiera Guinn Fletcher: Aerospace engineer on NASA’s Mars mission while still in her 20s.
• 2015 – Arlan Hamilton: Queer Black venture capitalist and founder of Backstage Capital to support underrepresented founders in tech.
• 2020s – Dr. Chanda Prescod-Weinstein: Black queer theoretical physicist working on dark matter and cosmology, and author of "The Disordered Cosmos".