Women in Science

Women have made significant contributions to the science field for hundreds of years. The involvement of women in the field of medicine occurred in several early civilizations. Women contributed to the proto-science of alchemy in the first or second centuries. During the Middle Ages, convents were an important place of education for women, and some of these communities provided opportunities for women to contribute to scholarly research. The first known woman to attend a university in a scientific field of studies was Laura Bassi, an eighteenth century Italian scientist. During the nineteenth century, women were excluded from more formal type of scientific education, but they began to be admitted into learned societies. In the nineteenth century, the rise of the women's college provided jobs for women scientists, and opportunities for education. This led Marie Curie to become the first woman to receive a Nobel Prize in 1903, and then went on to become a double Nobel Prize recipient in 1911. Both Nobel Prize awards were for her work on radiation. Overall, seventeen women have been awarded the Nobel Prize in physics, chemistry, physiology or medicine.