And since today is International Day of Women and Girls in Science, let's highlight a few of them - just a few women among thousands of others who helped shape the world we live in today.
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Dorothy Hodgkin discovered the structure of insulin after 36 years of work.
"I was captured for life by chemistry and by crystals."
Sophia Jex-Blake fought for women's rights to study medicine. She was involved in founding two medical schools for women.
"It seemed discreditable to Great Britain that all her daughters who desired a University education should be driven abroad to seek it."
Alice Augusta Ball developed the "Ball Method", the most effective treatment for leprosy during the early 20th century. She was 23.
Ada Lovelace is regarded as the first to recognize the full potential of computers and as one of the first computer programmers.
“That brain of mine is something more than merely mortal; as time will show.”