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Black Scientists

Cowboy123

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https://amp.interestingengineering.com/31-highly-influential-african-american-scientists

Patricia Era Bath
Patricia is best-known as the inventor of the Laserphaco Probe for cataract treatment that she patented in 1986. She was also the first African American to ever complete a residency in Ophthalmology in 1973.

Patricia also became the first female faculty member at the Department of Opthalmology at UCLA's Jules Stein Eye Institute. She would also establish the American Institute for the Prevention of Blindness in 1976.


Harold Amos

Harold Amos was the first African American Microbiologist and the first to become the department chair of Harvard Medical School.

Harold made various high profile discoveries in his discipline including the finding of the 5-methylcytosine in the E. coli RNA and spearheading research into the use of bacterial RNA to program the synthesis of higher cell proteins, insulin etc.

Harold was a well-respected educator too and often cited teaching as one of his many passions. he would receive many awards throughout his career including: the first Charles Drew World Medical Prize from Harvard University in 1989, an Honoris Causa doctoral degree from Harvard University in 1996, the Centennial Medal of the Harvard Graduate School of Arts and Sciences in 2000, and the National Academy of Science’ high

Valerie Thomas

Valerie is a highly accomplished and talented African-American scientist and inventor. She is best-known as the inventor of the Illusion Transmitter that has proved highly influential for NASA research.

Valerie also helped develop the image-processing systems for LANDSAT (the first satellite to send images from space).

Her invention would be widely adopted by NASA and is still used in the production of televisions and video screens. She held various senior roles at NASA including the Project Manager of the Space Physics Analysis Network and Associate Data Operations Officer.

George Washington Carver

George almost single handily built the peanut industry in the United States. His research would help the impoverished farming industry of southeastern Alabama by educating them in crop rotation and plant fertilization.

He is, however, most famous for his work on peanuts that earned him the title of 'peanut man' for his introduction of the potential of it as a foodstuff. George also discovered the nutritional benefit of sweet potatoes.

His discoveries earned him several patents and the 1923 Spingarn Medal. He was also posthumously inducted into the National Inventors Hall of Fame.

St. Elmo Brady

Elmo was the first African-American to receive a doctorate in Chemistry in the U.S.

Elmo would spend a quarter of a century developing the undergraduate program at Fisk University and founded the first graduate Chemistry program at a black college. He also helped build the Chemistry department at Tougaloo College in Jackson, Mississippi.

Dr. Betty Wright Harris

Dr. Betty Wright is best known for her development and invention of the TATB spot test for identifying explosives in the field. She successfully patented her invention which has been widely adopted by military and civil institutions the world over.

Dr. Shirley Ann Jackson

Dr. Jackson was the first African-American woman to earn a Ph.D. from MIT in Theoretical Physics and the second to earn a doctorate in Physics in general.

Her main contributions to science revolved around advancements in telecommunications that helped lead to the direct development of technologies like the portable fax machine, touch-tone phones and fiber optic cables and many more.

Benjamin Banneker

Benjamin is best known for his series of highly successful astronomical almanacs that 'predicted' events such as solar eclipses, sunrises, and sunsets.

Many also contained predictions of the weather and seasonal changes and medical remedies and advice on planting crops.

Dr. James Edward Maceo West

James is best known for his work in developing the electroacoustic transducer electret microphone (ETEM). This device is currently found in around 90% of modern microphones, most telephones, old tape recorders, camcorders, and other devices such as hearing aids and baby monitors.

West has also been a prolific writer contributing to scientific papers and books.

Dr. West was appointed president-elect of the Acoustical Society of America. John later joined the National Academy of Engineering in 1998.


Dr. Leonidas Harry Berry
Dr. Berry is best known for his work biopsy especially his development of a new sampling device called the Elder-Berry biopsy gastroscope that was invented in 1955.

He was also able to determine that alcoholism damaged the liver rather than the stomach (as was the popular belief at the time).


Alice Augusta Ball
Alice is best-known for her successful treatment of those suffering from Hansen's Disease, aka Leprosy. This would prove to be the world's first working treatment for this debilitating disease.

George Edward Alcorn Jr.
George is best known for his work on, and the invention of, the X-Ray Spectrometer. This invention was widely adopted by NASA and his invention would earn him the NASA Goddard Space Flight Center Inventor of the Year award in 1984.

Jane C. Wright
Jane would spend her career building in the foundational work of her father into chemotherapy. During the late 1940's Jane and her father began to test chemotherapeutic formulations for treating leukemia. and cancer of the lymphatic system.


Annie Easley

Their main contribution(s) to science and the world: Annie Easley was a trailblazing computer scientist and rocket scientist who developed a variety of critically important NASA software systems. She is, however, best known for her work on NASA's Centaur Rocket.

Arthur B. C. Walker Jr.
Arthur Walker Junior is best-known for his pioneering work in EUV/XUV optics and solar telescopes.

These telescopes would be used to produce the first images of the Sun's outer atmosphere during the 1980's.


Bettye Washington Greene
Bettye is best known for her research and development into the production of latex and other polymers.


Charles Henry Turner

Charles would publish no less than 49 scientific papers throughout his life. These included some fairly influential pieces such as: Hunting Habits of an American Sand Wasp, Psychological Notes on the Gallery Spider. His fascination with insects would also lead him to show that insects can hear and distinguish pitch, can learn through trial and error and that honeybees can see in color.

Lloyd Albert Quarterman

Lloyd is best known as a key scientist who worked on the Manhattan Project during the Second World War. Shortly after graduating he became on the few Black American scientists to be recruited by the top-secret project. He was primarily responsible for the design and implementation of a distillation process for purifying large quantities of hydrogen fluoride. This is needed to separate or enrich Uranium-235 isotopes. The U-235 that Quarterman helped accumulate was used to make Little Boy, the uranium bomb that was exploded over Hiroshima, Japan, in 1945.

Joan Murrell Owens

Joan is best known for her discovery of several new species of the genus Rhombopsammia. She also added a new species to the genus Letepsammia in 1994, naming L. Franki for her husband, Frank A. Owens.

Ernest Everett Just
Ernest is best known for his pioneering work in developing certain techniques in a number of areas of physiology. These included advancements in fertilization, experimental parthenogenesis, cell division, hydration, diversion, dehydration of cells and UV carcinogenic radiation effects on cells.

James Andrew Harris

James Andrew Harris is best known for his contribution to the discovery of Rutherfordium (Element 104) and Dubnium (Element 105). Although an equal claim was made by a Russian team around the same time. The dispute was resolved when the International Union of Pure and Applied Chemistry (UPAC) accepted both claims and ruled over the current naming of both elements.


Emmett Chappelle

Emmett is most famed for his work on life detection on Mars and improvements to environmental management.

Emmett created more than 35% of peer-reviewed papers scientific or technical publications, nearly fifty conference papers, and co-authored or edited numerous publications in his field. He also holds 14 patents

Patricia S. Cowings

Patricia S. Cowings has spent her career as the principal investigator on various studies notably the Autogenetic-Feedback Training Exercise (AFTE) – a treatment for space motion sickness.

The technique teaches astronauts to control 20 physiological responses from heart rate to involuntary muscle contractions. Patricia received many awards and honors throughout her career.



https://blog.helix.com/herman-branson/

Dr. Herman Branson, who helped discover a pivotal protein structure called the alpha helix. Using his knowledge of physics, Dr. Branson made significant contributions to our understanding of how proteins work and how they contribute to diseases like sickle cell anemia.
In essence, your DNA is a long chain of molecules that spells out instructions for building proteins, which are each built by our body to perform a certain function. There are thousands of different proteins in the human body, which are all constructed from amino acids linked end-to-end in a specific order determined by your DNA. These amino acid chains will naturally fold into superstructures based on the chemical and physical properties of the amino acids. This superstructure determines a protein’s function.
Until the 1940s, very little was known about the superstructure of proteins. Scientists had only just begun using X-ray crystallography to try to discern the molecular shape of biomolecules like proteins and DNA1,2. In the late 1940s, Dr. Herman Branson and his colleagues Dr. Linus Pauling and Dr. Robert Corey would made a breakthrough discovery when they accurately described the alpha helix protein structure, which is present in numerous proteins1,2. This structure is a critical part of many proteins that help read the DNA. It also helps hemoglobin proteins carry oxygen through the blood.
Prior to the discovery by Branson and his colleagues, there were hints that proteins contained this structure, but no one had yet figured out the molecular configuration of it. Dr. Branson received his PhD in physics from the University of Cincinnati in 1939, and was well equipped to help Pauling and Corey crack the puzzle1.
The discovery of the alpha helix was early in Dr. Branson’s career, and he would spend most of his time researching and teaching at Howard University. In his tenure, he published numerous papers on the molecular properties of Sickle cell disease3—a group of conditions in which the superstructure of the hemoglobin protein is distorted in a way that causes red blood cells to be shaped like sickles. By many accounts, the achievements of Dr. Branson extended far beyond the lab. He was a powerful advocate for historically black colleges and aided numerous young African American researchers in their careers (including Dr. Marie Maynard Daly). His success demonstrates the value in overcoming the perceived limits of labels and categories, both academically and socially.
 

Al Jilwah: Chapter IV

"It is my desire that all my followers unite in a bond of unity, lest those who are without prevail against them." - Satan

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