Women in Science

Women have made major contributions to the sciences for centuries. Yet surveys repeatedly show that most people can only name a few—often just one or two—female scientists. But if you look around, you'll see evidence of their work everywhere, from the clothing we wear to the X-rays used in hospitals.

Every year we celebrate the International Day of Women and Girls in Science, and while this has been a remarkable year for recognition of women in science (hello, “Hidden Figures”) there are still hundreds of relatively-unknown women who have changed the world with their research throughout history.

Amid a global push to get more girls interested in science, engineering, technology, and math, we wanted to take a moment to celebrate those who already are STEM superstars of the past and present.

In 2017, of almost 18 million scientists and engineers in the EU, 59% were men and 41% women.

Men were particularly overrepresented in high and medium-high technology manufacturing (83% of scientists and engineers in such manufacturing were male), while the gender ratio in the services sector was more balanced (55% male and 45% female).

However, in five EU Member States, the majority of scientists and engineers were women: Lithuania (57% female), Bulgaria and Latvia (both 53%), Portugal (51%) and Denmark (just over 50%).

Less than one third of scientists and engineers were women in Hungary and Luxembourg (both 25%), Finland (29%), and Germany (33%).

During two years we worked on the project activity Scientific women. We created 20 banners about the women in science.

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