Rita Levi-Montalcini was a Sephardic Jew born in 1909 in Turin who grew up fighting discrimination against her race and her gender; first having to convince her father that attending medical school would not “disrupt her potential life as a mother and wife”, then fighting to continue her academic career clandestinely after Benito Mussolini’s 1938 Manifesto of Race banned Jews from academic and professional careers. Levi-Montalcini continued her research in hiding during the Holocaust, setting up a laboratory in her family’s hiding space and using a false identity under protection from non-Jewish friends.

Rita Levi-Montalcini, an Italian Nobel Laureate was honored in 1986 for her joint discovery of nerve growth factor.

• Developmental Neurobiology and the Natural History of Nerve Growth Factor, Annual Review of Neuroscience, 1982
• Watch a conversation with Dr. Levi-Montalcini from 2011

Judith G. Hall, Clinical Geneticist and Pediatrician, was inducted into the Canadian Hall of Fame in 2015

To me, high achievement is not the number of publications but being a successful female in a world of professional men. And by that I mean caring more about peacemaking and nurturing the individual and the environment than success, winning, owning or directing.¹

• The Clinic is My Laboratory: Life as a Clinical Geneticist, Annual Review of Genomics and Human Genetics, 2017

Elaine Sarkin Jaffe, senior National Cancer Institute (NCI) investigator at the National Institutes of Health (NIH), one of the most-cited researchers in clinical medicine.

• The Microscope as a Tool for Disease Discovery — A Personal Voyage, Annual Review of Pathology: Mechanisms of Disease, 2017

Lee-Ann Jaykus, Scientific Director of NoroCORE

• Human Norovirus as a Foodborne Pathogen: Challenges and Developments, Annual Review of Food Science and Technology, 2015
• “Norovirus: The Perfect Pathogen” featuring research by Lee-Ann Jaykus in Knowable Magazine by Annual Reviews.

Ida Smedley-MacLean and Marjory Stephenson broke ground as the first women admitted to the London Chemical Society (1920). Stephenson was also one of the first women elected into the Royal Society. She shared the landmark election with Kathleen Lonsdale, after Hertha Ayrton’s rejection in 1902 resulted in a legal dispute over whether a woman could be a Fellow. In 1919 the Sex Disqualification (Removal) Act was passed as law and in 1929 Stephenson and Lonsdale won a majority vote among Fellows resulting in their election. Stephenson was awarded the MBE for her service on the Toxin Committee during World War II. Both of these women contributed to the first volume of Annual Review of Biochemistry in 1933.

Ida Smedley-MacLean (1877-1944), biochemist, co-founder of the British Federation of University Women (1907), president of the British Federation of University Women (1929-1935)

• “Chemistry of the Lipins,” Annual Review of Biochemistry, 1933

Marjory Stephenson, MBE, FRS, co-founder of the Society for General Microbiology (1885-1948)

• The Chemistry of the Bacteria, Annual Review of Biochemistry, 1932

Elizabeth Helen Blackburn, Australian-American Nobel Laureate (Physiology or Medicine) was awarded the Nobel Prize in 2009 for the co-discovery of how chromosomes are protected by telomeres and the enzyme telomerase.

• Telomerases, Annual Review of Biochemistry, 1992

Ada Yonath, crystallographer, the first Israeli woman to win the Nobel Prize (Chemistry, 2009)

I'm sorry that I can't, I can't think this is because of my gender. And, I don't think that I did something that is specially for women, or the opposite. During my time I had some very difficult years and I had very pronounced competition, all by men. But I don't think that this is because I was a woman. I'm pretty sure that if I was a man too they would compete, if the men would get to where I was at that time.

–Transcript of the telephone interview with Ada E. Yonath immediately following the announcement of the 2009 Nobel Prize in Chemistry. Nobelprize.org. Nobel Media AB 2014. Web. 1 Feb 2018.

• “A Bright Future for Antibiotics?”, Annual Review of Biochemistry, 2017

May Berenbaum, Entomologist, Editor of Annual Review of Entomology for 21 years, awarded the National Medal of Science (2014)

• Preface: Valedictory from a Gadfly Grammarian, Annual Review of Entomology, 2018
• Molecular Mechanisms of Metabolic Resistance to Synthetic and Natural Xenobiotics, Annual Review of Entomology, 2018

Jennifer A. Doudna, Nobel Laureate in Chemistry, American Biochemist and winner of many prestigious awards for her pioneering leadership in developing CRISPR-mediated genome editing

• CRISPR-Cas9 Structures and Mechanisms, Annual Review of Biophysics, 2017, Fuguo Jiang and Jennifer A. Doudna
• View all Annual Review articles by Dr. Doudna.

Mildred Dresselhaus (1930-2017) was driven by her passion for science, rather than actively seeking to inspire future generations with her legacy. She was motivated to pursue a career in science by her school teacher, Rosalyn Sussman Yalow (winner of 1977 Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine). In her research position at MIT Lincoln Lab, Dresselhaus was one of two women among one thousand men. Shortly before she died in early 2017, Dresselhaus was “immortalized” in a GE advertisement that asked the question “What if female scientists were treated like celebrities?”, aiming to attract more women to careers in STEM.

To be sure, if you have an interest and if you have the ability to do it there are opportunities, but nowadays it’s very different because women expect to have equality and equal recognition. When I started out I was only thinking of opportunities, so my early years I was focussing on that, but I’d join the movement. If we can have equality, why not?

—Mildred Dresselhaus, on receiving the Presidential Medal of Freedom

Mildred Dresselhaus, known as “the queen of carbon science”, was the first female Institute Professor at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. In recognition of her work, she was awarded the National Medal of Science, the Presidential Medal of Freedom, and was the first woman to receive the IEEE Medal of Honor (2015).

• Reflections on My Career in Condensed Matter Physics, Annual Review of Condensed Matter Physics, 2011

Katherine H. Freeman is a Distinguished Professor of Geosciences at Pennsylvania State University. She is a Co-Editor of the Annual Review of Earth and Planetary Sciences.

• Molecular Paleohydrology: Interpreting the Hydrogen-Isotopic Composition of Lipid Biomakers from Photosynthesising Organisms, Dirk Sachse, Isabelle Billault, Gabriel J. Bowen, Yoshito Chikaraishi, Todd E. Dawson, Sarah J. Feakins, Katherine H. Freeman et. al, Annual Review of Earth and Planetary Sciences 2012

Lisa Kaltenegger is known for her studies of the atmospheres of extrasolar planets, especially Earth-like ones and is a pioneer in the study of the Earth as an astronomical object evolving in time.

• How to Characterize Habitable Worlds and Signs of Life, Annual Review of Astronomy and Astrophysics, 2017
• Searching for life among the stars, a Q&A feature with Kaltenegger that was published in Knowable Magazine. In the feature, she discusses searching for planets that could sustain life.

In 1922, Mirra Komarovsky was advised by one of her early professors at Barnard College not to pursue higher education due to the double barriers she would face as a Jewish woman. She later joined the faculty of Barnard College for 32 years, before returning after just eight years of retirement to chair the women’s studies program for an additional 24 years. Professor Komarovsky wrote “Women in the Modern Wold: Their Education and Their Dilemmas” (1953, Irvington), which is credited as initiating the contemporary analysis of gender roles. On gender equality, she acknowledged that significant change was needed to reflect the modern aspirations of women:

Young women are becoming aware that the call to equal opportunities for women outside the home is an empty slogan as long as the society insists on traditional role segregation within the family. Some women react to this discovery with equanimity, others with frustration, resignation or indignation. But the real touchstone of their aspirations is the longing for a society in which the rhetoric of equality will be realized as fact. There is no denying that this would require major institutional changes.²

Russian-born American, Komarovsky, was among the pioneers who led her discipline in exploring gender and the role of women in society.

• Some Reflections on the Feminist Scholarship in Sociology, Annual Review of Sociology, 1991

Elinor Ostrom remains the only woman to win the Nobel Prize in Economics (2009). Her work was associated with the New Institutional Economics and the resurgence of political economy.³

• A Long Polycentric Journey, Annual Review of Political Science, 2010
• Watch an interview with Elinor here.

American sociologist Joan N. Huber focused her research on gender stratification. She served as President of Sociologists for Women in Society (1972-1974)

• Reproductive Biology, Technology, and Gender Inequality: An Autobiographical Essay, Annual Review of Sociology, 2008

Elizabeth F. Loftus is an American cognitive psychologist renowned for her work on human memory and the misinformation effect.

• Eavesdropping on Memory, Annual Review of Psychology, 2017
• Knowable Magazine article on Elizabeth F. Loftus and how her work has influenced the legal system. Read here.

Margaret Levi actively works in the fields of comparative political economy, labor politics, and democratic theory. She is the Co-Editor of the Annual Review of Political Science.

• Political Trust and Trustworthiness, Margaret Levi and Laura Stroker, Annual Review of Political Science, 2000

Karen S. Cook, American sociologist is the Ray Lyman Wilbur Professor of Sociology, Vice-Provost for Faculty Development and Diversity, and Director of the Institute for Research in the Social Sciences at Stanford University. She is the Co-Editor of the Annual Review of Sociology.

• Distributive Justice, Equity and Equality, Karen S. Cook and Karen A. Hegtvedt, Annual Review of Sociology, 1983

Susan Fiske, American psychologist is the Eugene Higgins Professor of Psychology and Public Affairs at Princeton University. Her research focuses on the influence of social relationships on stereotyping, prejudice and discrimination. She has been the Co-Editor of the Annual Review of Psychology for 18 years.

Fiske’s work has had real-world impact. The U.S. Supreme Court in a 1989 landmark decision on gender bias cited her expert testimony in discrimination cases. In 1998, she also testified before President Clinton’s Race Initiative Advisory Board, and in 2001-03, she co-authored a National Academy of Science, National Research Council report on Methods for Measuring Discrimination.
–https://www.fiskelab.org/people/

• Providing Expert Knowledge in an Adversarial Context: Social Cognitive Science in Employment Discrimination Cases, Susan T. Fiske and Eugene Borgida, Annual Review of Law and Social Science, 2008

Tanya M. Smith focuses her research on the dental microstructure, and how it informs understanding of human growth and development. She is an advocate for Women in STEM.

• Teeth and Human Life-History Evolution, Annual Review of Anthropology, 2013
• Read a Q&A with Tanya in Knowable Magazine on the truth in baby teeth and how fossilized remains of children have a lot to tell us about their short lives.

²New York Times Op-Ed page, 1981
³Aligica, Paul Dragos; Boettke, Peter (2010). “Ostrom, Elinor”. The New Palgrave Dictionary of Economics (Online ed.)