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Despite its upbeat subtitle, How the Glow of Radium Lit a Path for Women in Science, Dava Sobel’s widely praised new study of Marie Curie and the 45 women who worked in her laboratory reveals the persistent bias, discouragement and institutional barriers that marginalized these pioneering women scientists.
Rather than illustrating a clear path to gender equity in science, Sobel’s work reveals how systemic discrimination continued to thwart their progress, despite their significant contributions to groundbreaking research.
In her 2023 study, Pulitzer Prize–winning journalist Kate Zernike illustrates the entrenched sexism that persisted in science to the end of the 20th century. As recently as 1999, even the most accomplished women in fields like molecular genetics, geology, neuroscience and cancer research were routinely denied the recognition and resources granted to their less qualified male colleagues.
Zernike demonstrates that it was only through persistent advocacy and fighting against these discriminatory practices that these women began to chip away at the pervasive sexism of elite scientific institutions. Their struggle not only brought attention to the inequities they faced but also helped pave the way for future generations of women in science, slowly transforming the landscape of an often exclusionary and hierarchical system.
The history of women in science is littered with examples of women whose contributions were either minimized or outright attributed to male colleagues. The historian of science Margaret W. Rossiter termed this the “Matilda effect”—the systematic tendency to downplay or erase women’s contributions to scientific discoveries, with credit often being given to their male colleagues instead.
Nettie Stevens made groundbreaking discoveries about sex determination in 1905, demonstrating that sex is determined by chromosomes—specifically the XY system. However, her male colleague Edmund Beecher Wilson received much of the credit for this work. Despite Stevens’s foundational contributions to genetics, her role was overshadowed, illustrating how women’s scientific achievements have often been attributed to men.
Lise Meitner, a physicist who played an essential role in the discovery of nuclear fission, similarly saw her contributions minimized. While her theoretical work provided crucial insights into nuclear reactions, it was her colleague Otto Hahn who received the 1944 Nobel Prize in Chemistry. Meitner’s exclusion from the prize, despite her significant contributions, reveals how systemic bias has long denied women their due recognition in science.
In a similar case, Chien-Shiung Wu, a Chinese American physicist, conducted a pivotal experiment that disproved the conservation of parity, a fundamental law of physics. Wu’s experimental findings were crucial in confirming the theoretical work of Tsung-Dao Lee and Chen-Ning Yang, who went on to receive the Nobel Prize in 1957. Despite Wu’s central role, she was not included in the Nobel honors, reflecting the pervasive bias against acknowledging women’s contributions.
The field of bacterial genetics also saw women’s contributions marginalized. Esther Lederberg made important discoveries, including the identification of lambda phage, a virus that infects bacteria, and the development of the replica plating technique, which revolutionized bacterial research. Nevertheless, her then-husband, Joshua Lederberg, was awarded the 1958 Nobel Prize for Physiology or Medicine, while her critical contributions were minimized.
One of the most famous examples of the Matilda effect is Rosalind Franklin, whose work on X-ray diffraction was crucial in elucidating the structure of DNA. However, James Watson and Francis Crick received most of the credit, culminating in the 1962 Nobel Prize. Franklin’s role was largely overlooked until later historical reappraisals recognized the depth of her contributions to one of the greatest scientific breakthroughs of the 20th century.
Another telling case is that of Jocelyn Bell Burnell, who as a graduate student in 1967 discovered pulsars, a type of rotating neutron star. Her supervisor, Antony Hewish, received the 1974 Nobel Prize in Physics for this discovery, with Bell Burnell’s pivotal role in the research going largely unacknowledged.
These stories illustrate the systemic barriers that have historically marginalized women in science. Misogyny in the scientific community manifests not only in denying women opportunities but also in rewriting the narrative of discovery to exclude or downplay their achievements. Addressing this bias requires an ongoing effort to reshape how scientific recognition is awarded, ensuring that all contributors are fairly acknowledged.
The underrepresentation and marginalization of women in science are not merely byproducts of personal gender bias but are deeply embedded within the structures, cultures and systems that govern the scientific community itself.
Historian Margaret Rossiter’s three-volume Women Scientists in America explores how systemic sexism has historically shaped the landscape of science. She recounts the overlooked stories of women scientists whose contributions were either erased or downplayed, revealing patterns of institutionalized misogyny that extend beyond individual prejudice. This institutionalized bias encompasses educational barriers, discriminatory hiring practices, exclusion from professional networks and credit denial.
Rossiter shows that cultural narratives suggested women were biologically unsuited for scientific careers or that they would eventually prioritize family over work. However, misogyny went beyond cultural narratives. Women were often denied access to advanced education and academic appointments, restricted to subordinate roles such as laboratory assistants and excluded from leadership positions. These practices were reinforced through discriminatory tenure and promotion practices, where women were often denied career advancement even when their research output equaled or surpassed that of their male peers.
Key mechanisms of this institutionalized misogyny include:
- Invisible barriers that discouraged women from pursuing advanced education and research roles through societal expectations of gender roles.
- Credit denial, where women scientists frequently found their contributions minimized or attributed to male colleagues, reinforcing the myth of women’s inferiority in scientific innovation.
- Institutional exclusion from the informal male networks that enabled men to advance their careers through mentorship, collaborations and opportunities from which women were excluded.
- Social and professional isolation in male-dominated cultures in scientific institutions that left women without supportive peer communities, further hindering their career advancement.
- Tokenism, where women scientists were viewed as exceptions, expected to conform to male norms rather than being seen as equal contributors in their fields.
Rossiter’s research reveals that misogyny in science is the result of both overt discrimination and deeply entrenched cultural and institutional practices that perpetuate gender hierarchies.
The concept of systemic misogyny challenges the idea that science is purely meritocratic and objective. Although science is often portrayed as a field where talent and hard work dictate success, it has long been shaped by institutional and cultural biases that have disproportionately favored white men over women and marginalized groups.
Acknowledging these systemic biases requires rethinking the history and practice of science, a shift that often sparks resistance. Many view science as an arena of merit, and questioning how gender bias has influenced scientific recognition and resource distribution raises uncomfortable questions about what constitutes achievement in science. If key contributions have been overlooked or misattributed, it forces us to reconsider how success and excellence in science have been defined and challenges the historical record of discovery. Recognizing these biases can feel like an attack on the integrity of science itself.
However, addressing systemic bias is not about discrediting past achievements. Rather, it’s about recognizing the structural inequities that have marginalized women and prevented them from receiving due credit for their work. Only by acknowledging and dismantling these institutional barriers can the scientific community create a more inclusive environment where merit, not gender, determines success. This shift is essential to ensuring that future generations of scientists, regardless of gender, have equal opportunities to contribute to and shape the future of science.
The recent revelations of fraudulent scientific research, particularly in studies of Alzheimer’s disease and cancer, have shaken public trust in the scientific community. These incidents expose underlying issues within the culture of science that go beyond isolated cases of misconduct. While it is easy to point to individual bad actors, the problem appears to be more systemic, involving distorted incentives, pressure to publish and gaps in the peer review process.
Science, ideally, is rooted in objectivity, rigor and self-correction. Yet, the reality is that scientific research occurs within a competitive environment that prioritizes publication in high-impact journals, securing funding and advancing one’s career. These pressures can push researchers toward unethical behavior, such as manipulating data or misrepresenting findings, in order to meet their expectations.
One of the major factors contributing to this problem is the publish-or-perish culture. Under constant pressure to produce significant, novel results, this can lead researchers to cherry-pick data or fabricate results to meet those demands. The incentive structure in science often rewards breakthroughs over incremental progress, leading some to take shortcuts or manipulate results to present more groundbreaking findings. Additionally, securing grants often requires presenting promising or positive outcomes, further incentivizing researchers to skew their data.
The peer-review system, designed to be a safeguard for ensuring the validity of scientific work, is not without its flaws. While peer review does catch some issues, it can be inadequate in thoroughly verifying data integrity or identifying fraudulent practices. Peer reviewers, often overburdened and undercompensated, may not have the time or resources to deeply investigate the data or methodologies presented in a paper. Moreover, peer review tends to rely on trust and assumes that researchers are reporting their findings honestly, making it challenging to detect fraudulent work unless whistle-blowers or postpublication scrutiny reveal discrepancies.
These systemic issues within the culture of science highlight the need for reforms that go beyond individual accountability. Solutions could include implementing more rigorous checks in the peer-review process, creating systems that promote transparency and data sharing and revisiting the incentive structures in scientific research to prioritize integrity and reproducibility over sensationalism and careerism. Funding bodies and academic institutions could also play a role by fostering a culture that values long-term, incremental progress and discourages the pressure to publish flashy, groundbreaking results at any cost.
The cases of fraudulent research remind us that while science has the tools for self-correction, those mechanisms must be strengthened to protect the integrity of research, especially in areas as critical as dementia and cancer treatment. Ultimately, addressing the deeper structural issues that encourage unethical behavior is key to restoring trust in scientific research.
The revelations about systemic and structural bias in science—whether related to gender, race or class—are part of a much broader reckoning with history. As we confront past injustices and inequalities, it’s natural to ask whether we should repudiate this history entirely or find more nuanced ways to engage with it. Clearly, we must call out past evils, but this does not necessarily require a wholesale repudiation of scientific progress.
Instead, these revelations offer an opportunity for a more constructive dialogue—one that allows us to learn from our mistakes while appreciating the complexity of progress. Recognizing bias in science doesn’t discredit scientific achievements as a whole, but it does demand an honest acknowledgment of how those achievements unfolded within exclusionary frameworks. The exclusion of women and people of color from the scientific canon does not invalidate scientific discoveries but reminds us that these accomplishments came at the cost of marginalizing others.
One of the most productive ways to engage with these historical injustices is by treating history as a teaching tool. Rather than rejecting the past, we can examine how bias shaped institutions and knowledge systems. This perspective helps identify and dismantle ongoing inequalities. For example, understanding how structural sexism marginalized women in science can guide efforts to create more inclusive environments in today’s academy.
History is not static; our interpretations evolve as new information comes to light. Scientific figures who were once celebrated for their discoveries are now understood within a more complex context, one that reveals the societal and structural forces that shaped their successes while excluding others. This evolving understanding helps us refine our values and institutions without erasing the positive contributions that were made.
Instead of repudiating the past, we can focus on reconciliation. This involves not just acknowledging historical wrongs but taking active steps to address present-day inequities. In science, this might mean increasing diversity, fostering mentorship for underrepresented groups and ensuring access to research and discovery for a wider range of people. Addressing historical injustices can create a more inclusive and innovative scientific community for the future.
The German-Jewish philosopher Walter Benjamin, in his 1940 Theses on the Philosophy of History, argued that one of history’s essential functions is to “redeem the past.” He believed history must rescue and give meaning to the voices of the oppressed, those silenced by dominant narratives of progress and power. Benjamin’s metaphor of the “Angel of History” reflects this: As the angel is blown into the future, it helplessly faces the wreckage of the past—symbolizing the devastation and suffering often erased by histories of triumph.
Redeeming the past means confronting the unfinished business of historical wrongs and recognizing how they shape the present. By facing these historical injustices directly, we don’t discredit the past, but rather enrich it with a fuller understanding—ensuring that progress is built on a foundation of truth and inclusivity.
