By Tim Lambert
Aglaonike was an Ancient Greek astronomer. She lived about 150 BC. Little is known about her, but she was highly regarded in her day.
Hypatia was an astronomer and mathematician in Alexandria, Egypt. She died in 415 AD.
Sophia Brahe was born in 1559. She was an astronomer and a horticulturist. She helped her brother, Tycho Brahe, with astronomical measurements.
The astronomer Maria Cunitz was born in 1610. She wrote a famous book called Urania Propitia.
Maria Kirch was born in 1670. She was the first woman to discover a comet.
Maria Clara Eimmart was born in 1676. She was famous for her illustrations of heavenly objects.
Nicole-Reine Lepaute was born in 1723. She was a famous astronomer and mathematician.
The great astronomer Caroline Herschel was born on 16 March 1750. She was born in Germany but spent most of her life in Britain. In 1828 The Royal Astronomical Society awarded her the gold medal for science. In 1846, she was given the Prussian Gold Medal for science.
The astronomer Maria Mitchell was born on 1 August 1818. In 1847, she discovered a comet. The King of Denmark gave her a gold medal for the discovery, and in 1848, she became the first woman elected to the American Academy of Arts and Sciences.
Irish astronomer Agnes Mary Clerke was born on 10 February 1842. She wrote about astronomy and other subjects. She wrote a famous book about astronomy, which simplified the subject for Victorian readers.
Mary Whitney was born in 1847. She was the head of the Vassar College Observatory.
Scottish astronomer Williamina Fleming was born in 1857. She discovered the Horsehead Nebula in 1888.
Dorothea Klumpke was born in 1861. In 1934, she was made a Chevalière of the Légion d’Honneur for her contributions to astronomy.
Annie Cannon was born in 1863. She is famous for classifying stars.
Astronomer Fiammetta Wilson was born in 1864. She studied meteors.
Famous astronomer Henrietta Leavitt was born in 1868. She found a way to measure the distance of stars.
The first photo of Jupiter was taken in 1879 by Irish astronomer Agnes Mary Clerke.
Cecilia Payne-Gaposchkin was born in 1900. In 1925 she realised that stars are mainly made of hydrogen and helium.
Ruby Payne-Scott was born in Australia on 28 May 1912. She was the first woman radio astronomer.
Edith Muller was born in 1918. In 1976, she became the first woman General Secretary of the International Astronomical Union.
Vera Rubin was born in 1928. She is known for her work on galactic rotation.
Beatrice Tinsley was born in 1941. She was the first female professor of astronomy at Yale University.
Astronomer Jocelyn Bell Burnell was born in 1943. In 1967, she discovered pulsars (very small, rapidly rotating stars that emit regular pulses of radiation).
