At this festive time of year, when many people are bringing trees into their homes to decorate for the holidays,... more

Two female botanists – Elzada Clover and Lois Jotter – made headlines for riding the rapids of the Colorado River... more

Carolyn Beatrice Parker came from a family of doctors and academics and worked during World War II as a physicist... more

Anna Von Mertens' thoughtful new exploration of Henrietta Swan Leavitt's life describes and illuminates Leavitt's decades-long study of stars, including... more

Although initial clinical trials of tamoxifen as a treatment of breast cancer were positive, Imperial Chemical Industries (ICI) did not... more

In the early 1960s, chemist Dr. Dora Richardson synthesized a chemical compound that became one of the most important drugs... more

While researching her book about thalidomide in America, Jennifer Vanderbes discovered that there were far more survivors in the U.S.... more

It’s September 2024 and a group of American thalidomide survivors arrive in Washington D.C. to lobby the government for support.... more

It’s the summer of 1962 and thalidomide has been off the market in Europe for months. But in the U.S.,... more

It’s 1961 and Widukind Lenz, a German pediatrician, is going door to door in his efforts to find out what... more

It’s the early 1960s and the German pharmaceutical market is booming. A sedative called Contergan is one of the bestselling... more

In this first chapter of a new five-part season we meet Dr. Frances Oldham Kelsey, a physician and pharmacologist who... more

In the 1950s, a German drug company developed a new sedative that was supposed to be 100% safe: thalidomide. So... more

In the 1920s, when newspapers and magazines started to showcase stories about science, many of the early science journalists were... more

By the second half of the 20th century, physicists were on a mission to find the ultimate building blocks of... more

Dr. Jess Wade is a physicist at Imperial College London who’s made it her mission to write and update the... more

Dr. Nancy Hopkins, a molecular biologist who made major discoveries in cancer genetics, became an unlikely activist in her early... more

“The only time I ever saw something that I thought was abnormal…there was a human arm in the refrigerator,” said... more

When Laura J. Martin decided to write a history of ecological restoration, she didn’t think she would have to go... more

In our final episode, we explore Dorothy Andersen’s legacy — what she left behind and how her work has lived... more

The missing portrait of Dr. Andersen takes us on a journey into the perils of memorialization and who gets to... more

Our associate producer, Sophie McNulty, rummages through boxes in a Connecticut basement, looking for clues to Dorothy Andersen’s life story.... more

A few important things have happened in the three years since we first aired The Pathologist in the Basement, the... more

When poet Jessy Randall started researching the lives of female scientists she became angry. And we certainly can relate here... more

“We were each put on earth to torment the other,” says cognitive scientist Steven Pinker of Elizabeth Bates, a psychologist... more

Melba Phillips, who grew up on a farm in Indiana at the turn of the 20th century, was one of... more

Cecilia Payne-Gaposchkin was in her early 20s when she figured out what the stars are made of. Both she and... more

The year is 1897 and Annie Maunder, an amateur astronomer, is boarding a steamship bound for India from England. Her... more

In this episode of Lost Women of Science Conversations, Michelle Nijhuis talks to historian Catherine McNeur about how she rediscovered... more

While working at the Salk Institute in California, Ursula Bellugi discovered that sign language was made up of specific building... more