Born: 1939, United States
Died: NA
Country most active: United States
Also known as: Barbara Scott
The following is excerpted from Infinite Women creator Allison Tyra’s book Uncredited: Women’s Overlooked, Misattributed, and Stolen Work.
Women are often expected to take on caregiving roles, for children, spouses, elderly parents, and any other type of dependent. This leaves little time and energy for other pursuits. 1978 National Inventor of the Year (US) Barbara Askins waited until her children were in school to finish her chemistry Bachelors and Masters degrees, then went on to work for NASA, developing a new way to process film using radioactive materials. The astronomical and geological images she worked on held much more detail, making them significantly more valuable to scientists, and her process was also applied to x-rays and restoration of old photos.