This is a list of women chemists. It should include those who have been important to the development or practice of chemistry. Their research or application has made significant contributions in the area of basic or applied chemistry.
Eight women have won the Nobel Prize in Chemistry (listed above), awarded annually since 1901 by the Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences. Marie Curie was the first woman to receive the prize in 1911, which was her second Nobel Prize (she also won the prize in physics in 1903, along with Pierre Curie and Henri Becquerel – making her the only woman to be award two Nobel prizes). Her prize in chemistry was for her "discovery of the elements radium and polonium, by the isolation of radium and the study of the nature and compounds of this remarkable element." Irene Joliot-Curie, Marie's daughter, became the second woman to be awarded this prize in 1935 for her discovery of artificial radioactivity. Dorothy Hodgkin won the prize in 1964 for the development of protein crystallography. Among her significant discoveries are the structures of penicillin and vitamin B12. Forty five years later, Ada Yonath shared the prize with Venkatraman Ramakrishnan and Thomas A. Steitz for the study of the structure and function of the ribosome. Emmanuelle Charpentier and Jennifer A Doudna won the 2020 prize in chemistry “for the development of a method for genome editing.”[2] Charpentier and Doudna are the first women to share the Nobel Prize in chemistry.[3]
2006 – Ada Yonath "for ingenious structural discoveries of the ribosomal machinery of peptide-bond formation and the light-driven primary processes in photosynthesis.[4]
2022 – Bonnie L. Bassler and Carolyn R. Bertozzi "for their seminal contributions to understanding the chemistry of cellular communication and inventing chemical methodologies to study the role of carbohydrates, lipids, and proteins in such biological processes."[5]
The following list is split into the centuries when the majority of the scientist's work was performed. The scientist's listed may be born and perform work outside of the century they are listed under.
Louise Hammarström (1849–1917), Swedish mineral chemist, first formally educated female Swedish chemist
Edith Humphrey (1875–1978), Inorganic chemist, probably the first British woman to gain a doctorate in chemistry
Julia Lermontova (1846–1919), Russian chemist, first Russian female doctorate in chemistry
Laura Linton (1853–1915), American chemist, teacher, and physician
Rachel Lloyd (1839–1900), First American female to earn a doctorate in chemistry, first regularly admitted female member of the American Chemical Society, studied sugar beets
Fanny Rysan Mulford Hitchcock (1851–1936), one of thirteen (American) women to graduate with a degree in chemistry in the 1800s, and the first to graduate with a doctorate in philosophy of chemistry. Her areas of focus were in entomology, fish osteology, and plant pathology.[6]
Maria Skłodowska-Curie (1867–1934), Polish-French physicist and chemist (discoverer of polonium and radium, pioneer in radiology); Nobel laureate in physics 1903, and in chemistry 1911
Emily Balskus, American organic and biological chemist, and microbiologist. Recipient of the 2020 Alan T. Waterman Award for her work on understanding the chemistry of metabolic processes. Professor at Harvard University.
Natalie Banerji, Swiss chemist and Professor of Chemistry at the University of Bern who studies organic and hybrid materials using ultrafast spectroscopies.
Jane P. Chang, chemical engineer, materials scientist and professor at UCLA known for her research developing advanced atomic layer deposition (ALD) and etching techniques with applications in microelectronics and energy storage devices.
Sherry Chemler, American Organic Chemist. Professor University at Buffalo.[8][9] ACS Cope Scholar Award recipient (2017).[10]
Elena Galoppini, Italian chemist and professor at Rutgers University–Newark whose research focuses on the development of redox- and photo-active molecules to modify surfaces.
Paula T. Hammond, American chemical engineer focusing on macromolecular design and synthesis of materials for drug delivery systems, particularly in relation to cancer, immunology, and immunotherapy. Professor at MIT.[7][20]
Jeanne Hardy, American biophysicist and chemical biologist. Known for her work in the design of allosteric binding sites and control elements into human proteases.[21] Professor at the University of Massachusetts.
Geraldine Harriman, American Organic Chemist. Developed Firsocostat. Chief Scientific Officer and co-founder of HotSpot.[22][23]
Rachel Haurwitz, American biochemist and structural biologist. Her work regards CRISPR based technologies, she is a cofounder of Caribou Biosciences, a genome editing and cell therapy development company.[24]
Nga Lee (Sally) Ng, atmospheric chemist studying particulates and their effects on air quality, climate, and human health
Sarah O'Connor, American plant synthetic biologist working in England
Kimberly Prather, American atmospheric chemist whose research contributed to understanding of atmospheric aerosols and their impact on air quality, climate, and human health
Gillian Reid, British inorganic chemist. President elect (2020-present) and present (2022-present) of the Royal Society of Chemistry. Professor at the University of Southampton.
Magdalena Titirici, materials chemist focusing on sustainable materials for energy applications. Professor at Imperial College London.
Claudia Turro, American inorganic chemist who studies light-initiated reactions of metal complexes with application to disease treatment and solar energy conversion.
Seble Wagaw, American process chemist and pharma exec
Marcey Lynn Waters, American chemical biologist and supramolecular chemist
Jenny Y Yang, American chemist and clean energy researcher at UCI
Wendy Young, American medicinal chemist and pharmaceutical executive. Chair of ACS Medicinal Chemistry Division (2017).
^Creese, Mary (1998). Ladies in the Laboratory? American and British Women in Science, 1800-1900: A Survey of their Research (1st ed.). Lanham, MD & London: The Scarecrow Press. p. 256. ISBN0810832879.
^Czarnik, Anthony W.; DeWitt, Sheila Hobbs, eds. (December 18, 1997). A Practical Guide to Combinatorial Chemistry (ACS Professional Reference Book) 1st Edition. American Chemical Society. ISBN978-0841234857.
