Agnodice (Ancient Greek: 4th century BCE) is a legendary figure credited as the first female midwife or physician in ancient Athens. Her story is told by the Roman author Gaius Julius Hyginus in his Fabulae. According to Hyginus, Agnodice studied medicine under Herophilus, and worked as a physician in her home city of Athens disguised as a man, because women at the time were forbidden from practising medicine. As her popularity with female patients grew, rival physicians accused her of seducing the women of Athens. She was tried, and revealed her sex to the jury by lifting her tunic (a gesture known in ancient Greek as anasyrmos). Accused of illegally practising medicine as a woman, she was defended by the women of Athens who praised her for her effective treatments. She was acquitted, and the law against female physicians in Athens was revoked.

Teano, born in Crotona in the 6th century BC, was a mathematician, Greek philosopher, wife of Pythagoras and member of the Pythagorean school. Daughter of Milo, patron of Pythagoras. She is credited with having written treatises on mathematics, physics and medicine, and also on the golden ratio.

Aglaonike of Thessaly was a Greek astronomer of the 2nd or 1st century BC. She is mentioned in the writings of Plutarch and in the scholia to Apollonius of Rhodes as a female astronomer and as the daughter of Hegetor of Thessaly. She was regarded as a sorceress for her ability to make the moon disappear from the sky, which has been taken to mean she could predict the time and general area where a lunar eclipse would occur.

Carolina Lucretia Herschel (16 March 1750 – 9 January 1848) was a German astronomer, whose most significant contributions to astronomy were the discoveries of several comets, including the periodic comet 35P/Herschel–Rigollet, which bears her name.

Gerty Theresa Cori (née Radnitz; August 15, 1896 – October 26, 1957) was an Austro-Hungarian-American biochemist who in 1947 was the third woman to win a Nobel Prize in science, and the first woman to be awarded the Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine, for her significant role in the "discovery of the course of the catalytic conversion of glycogen".

Dorothy Mary Crowfoot Hodgkin (12 May 1910 – 29 July 1994) was a Nobel Prize-winning British chemist who advanced the technique of X-ray crystallography to determine the structure of biomolecules, which became an essential tool in structural biology.

Maria Goeppert Mayer (June 28, 1906 – February 20, 1972) was a German-born American theoretical physicist, and Nobel laureate in Physics for proposing the nuclear shell model of the atomic nucleus. She was the second woman to win a Nobel Prize in physics, the first being Marie Curie. In 1986, the Maria Goeppert-Mayer Award for early-career women physicists was established in her honor.

Rita Levi-Montalcini (1909 –2012) was an Italian Nobel laureate, honored for her work in neurobiology. She was awarded the 1986 Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine jointly with colleague Stanley Cohen for the discovery of nerve growth factor (NGF). From 2001 until her death, she also served in the Italian Senate as a Senator for Life. This honor was given due to her significant scientific contributions.

Mercè Rodoreda (1908–1983) was a renowned Catalan novelist and one of the most influential figures in Catalan literature. Born in Barcelona, Spain, she rose to prominence with her novel "La plaça del Diamant" ("The Time of the Doves"), hailed as one of the most important works in contemporary Catalan literature. Rodoreda's writing is characterized by a deeply personal style, exploring themes of love, loss, and the struggle for identity against the backdrop of the Spanish Civil War and post-war period. Her literary career spans several decades, during which she published numerous novels, short stories, and a collection of poems, earning numerous accolades. Her work has been translated into over 30 languages, cementing her legacy as a pivotal figure in 20th-century literature.

Sappho (circa 630 – 570 BCE) was an ancient Greek lyric poet from the island of Lesbos. She is renowned for her powerful and emotive poetry, which focused primarily on expressions of love and passion. Sappho's verse, characterized by its lyricism and personal voice, was so influential that she was often referred to as "The Tenth Muse" in antiquity. Her work, mostly composed for single voice with lyre accompaniment, survives only in fragments today, yet these pieces have had a lasting impact on the development of both lyric poetry and the portrayal of female sexuality and emotion in literature. Despite the scarcity of her complete works, Sappho's legacy as a pioneering figure in women's literature is unchallenged.

Frances Elizabeth Allen (1932-2020) was an American computer scientist, renowned for her pioneering contributions to the field of compiler optimization and parallel computing. She became the first woman to receive the Turing Award, often considered the "Nobel Prize of Computing," in 2006. This prestigious recognition was for her work in program optimization and her role in shaping and directing research that led to widespread adoption of high-performance computers. Allen's career spanned more than four decades at IBM, where she made significant strides in automatic program parallelization, which became essential for modern computing systems. Her lasting legacy includes mentoring many young computer scientists and promoting the advancement of women in technology.

Nawal El Saadawi (1931-2021) was an Egyptian feminist writer, activist, physician, and psychiatrist. She gained international recognition for her bold writings and activism, which focused on women's issues, including female genital mutilation, which she vocally opposed. Her books, such as "Woman at Point Zero" and "The Hidden Face of Eve," critically examine and challenge the status of women in both Arab society and the wider world. El Saadawi's work often led to controversy and political backlash in her home country, including imprisonment in 1981. Despite these challenges, she remained an unwavering voice for women's rights and equality throughout her life.

Halide Edib Adıvar  11 June 1884 – 9 January 1964 was a Turkish novelist, teacher, and a nationalist and feminist intellectual. She was best known for her novels criticizing the low social status of Turkish women and what she saw from her observation as the lack of interest of most women in changing their situation. She was a Pan-Turkist and several of her novels advocated for the Turanism movement.

Halide Edib Adıvar is also remembered for her role in the forced assimilation of children orphaned in the Armenian genocide.

Rosa Sensat i Vilà (17 June 1873 – 1 October 1961)was a Catalan teacher. She contributed to the development of the Catalan public schools during the first third of the 20th century.

Sensat spread the new educational trends, and in 1914 she became the first director of the girls section of Barcelona's Escola de Bosc. In 1921 she was commissioned to design the studies program for Barcelona's Institut de Cultura i Biblioteca Popular de la Dona, a cultural centre created in 1909 by Francesca Bonnemaison which was the first centre in Europe especially focused in women's cultural and working education.[3] During that period, Sensat gave courses and conferences for Mancomunitat de Catalunya's educational programs, in summer schools, and also in Institut de Cultura i Biblioteca Popular de la Dona. She also participated in several international conferences on education, such as the 1st national conference on primary education (Barcelona, 1909), the 3rd international conference on Enseignement Menager (Paris, 1922), and the Écoles Nouvelles conference (Nice, 1932).

A group of teachers created the Escola de Mestres Rosa Sensat (Rosa Sensat teaching school) in 1955, in acknowledgement of Sensat's work regarding the spreading of new educational trends and her ability to manage schools.