Books in Trailblazers in Science and Technology series

Women in Science and Technology: Katherine Johnson gives readers in grades 1-3 a brief biography of NASA mathematician Katherine Johnson. It covers her childhood, work for the space program, and passion for STEM education. As a child, Katherine Johnson loved to count, and she grew into a woman whose math skills helped send people into space. Her work at NASA was critical to the first space flights. Her successes inspire young people to enjoy math and science. The biographies in this collection introduce students to influential women in science and technology, from astronauts to medical doctors. Each book includes a glossary, comprehension questions, a time line, and an extention activity.

Women in Science and Technology: Mae C. Jemison gives readers in grades 1-3 a brief biography of the first African-American woman astronaut, Mae C. Jemison. Readers will discover that she is also a doctor, dancer, businesswoman, and educator. Learn about how Mae went from a child with big dreams to a woman who inspires many.The biographies in this collection introduce students to influential women in science and technology, from astronauts to medical doctors. Each book includes a glossary, comprehension questions, a time line, and an extention activity.

In 1944, Alfred Blalock, Helen Taussig, and Vivien Thomas revolutionized surgical treatment of the heart and nearby blood vessels through an improbable partnership among a white male surgeon, a white female physician, and an African-American male laboratory technician. Separately, each of these individuals was brilliant. Blalock discovered the cause and best treatment of the deadly medical condition called shock, which can occur after severe injury or loss of blood. Taussig essentially founded pediatric cardiology, the medical subspecialty dealing with children's heart ailments. And Thomas was an inventor, and to those who knew him, close to a surgical genius. It was the combination of their skills, however, that made medical history. Through their combined efforts, they found a solution to "blue baby" syndrome, which saved thousands of children's lives and showed that operating on the heart was possible. In this interesting new book, readers will be drawn into the work of these medical pioneers.

When Stanford graduate students Larry Page and Sergey Brin collaborated on the search engine Google, they didn't realize that their invention would soon become so ingrained in Web culture that its name would be used as a verb. As the search engine of choice worldwide, Google ranks Web sites' popularity according to how many other sites link to them, increasing the chances that the desired Web site is in the first few results. More than just a search engine today, Google boasts maps, email, videos, e-commerce, news, social networking, and much more. Larry Page and Sergey Brin shows how the combination of personal decisions and particular opportunities for Page and Brin have led to remarkable results in their professional and personal lives.

As a scientist and businessman, Nikola Tesla saw his fortunes reverse as many times as his alternating current method of conducting electricity. Born in Croatia, Tesla found his way to America where he met fellow inventor Thomas A. Edison. However, the two brilliant men did not share similar methods of experimentation and soon parted ways. Tesla soon drew the attention of businessman George Westinghouse with his alternating current (AC), a method of delivering electricity more efficiently and over greater distances than Edison's direct current (DC). With Westinghouse's support, Tesla's method soon became dominant in the industry. Emboldened, Tesla set up a laboratory in Colorado, where his electricity experiments soon attracted attention both good and bad. Though this was where he built his famous Tesla coil, which turns a small amount of electricity into a great spark, Tesla also claimed here that he received messages from aliens in outer space, discrediting his legitimate advances. Again, Tesla's luck seemed to alternate on a positive course with backing from J.P. Morgan to build a station on Long Island to broadcast messages and information wirelessly to the world. However, the tower soon ran over budget, and Tesla's fortunes had fallen again. Today, Tesla's legacy is on the rise his insights and theories about wireless transmission and communication are hardly out of place in a world dominated by cell phones and Wi-Fi. Nikola Tesla outlines what biographers have discovered about Tesla and explores both his amazing achievements and his stunning failures.

Growing up in the interwar period in London, Rosalind Franklin was determined to become a scientist, defying her father's wishes. After World War II, Franklin worked at the French government's central chemical research laboratory, where she learned X-ray crystallography. This technique relies on a beam of X-rays that passes through a crystal and strikes photographic film, letting a trained reader to see a three-dimensional arrangement of atoms. Her training in this field led to opportunities to photograph DNA, which allowed researchers to study in depth this complex molecule and to come to conclusions about its structure, including scientists James Watson and Francis Crick. Though Franklin proposed several conclusions similar to Watson and Crick's, Franklin was not sufficiently credited for her photographic work that led to their discovery. In 1958, this unsung scientist's life was cut short at age 37 by ovarian cancer. Watson and Crick later won a Nobel Prize for their DNA research, but credit escaped the late scientist with the artist's eye for capturing complex atoms on film. Rosalind Franklin delves into this woman's remarkable career and her contributions to the study of human biology.

Women in Science and Technology: Annie Easley gives readers in grades 1-3 a brief biography of the NASA computer scientist. It covers her childhood, work for the space program, and outreach. Annie Easley didn't plan to become a computer, but she needed a job, and she was good at math. Her work at NASA helped send rockets into space. She lived a life of learning and helping others. Her story inspires all young people to enjoy science and math.The biographies in this collection introduce students to influential women in science and technology, from astronauts to medical doctors. Each book includes a glossary, comprehension questions, a time line, and an extention activity.

In the 42 years that Edward Pickering directed the Harvard College Observatory, he and his team of women "computers" made strides in promoting the new field of astrophotography, discovered the first spectroscopic binary star system, and cataloged more than 225,000 stars. Pickering hired women such as Henrietta Leavitt, who found a way to measure the distances to faraway stars, and Cecilia Payne-Gaposchkin, whose later work became the foundation for astrophysics, to process astronomical data gathered at the observatory. The advances these women made under Pickering's direction broadened the window of professional opportunity for women as well as our greater understanding of the universe. This new title highlights the lives of Pickering and his women "computers."

Marie and Pierre Curie, their daughter Irène Joliot-Curie, and her husband Frédéric Joliot-Curie were one of science's most remarkable and influential families. Their painstaking research into the mysteries of radioactivity allowed scientists to reach a new understanding about the structure of atoms and opened a new field of medical treatment. The Curie Family: Exploring Radioactivity illustrates how the Curies' startling discoveries were major factors in the development of nuclear physics. This new branch of science would have profound implications for our understanding of matter and energy, in addition to giving rise to hopes for abundant power and fears of ultimate destruction. In addition, Madame Curie's lasting legacy can be found in today's growing number of highly talented women scientists.

In the 20th century, the family name "Leakey" became synonymous with paleoanthropology and the search for human origins. Born to British missionaries in Kenya in the early 20th century, patriarch Louis S.B. Leakey explored East Africa and what is now Tanzania, finding skulls of human ancestors to fill in the evolutionary roadmap to modern man. Leakey worked alongside his wife, Mary, herself an experienced archaeologist and anthropologist at a time when women did not pursue science as a career. The Leakey Family outlines this fascinating family's struggles and accomplishments, including its legacy in paleoanthropology, expressed both in the anchoring of human origins in Africa and the development of techniques still used every day in the field by researchers.