Institute Professor Mildred S. Dresselhaus was one of five women inducted into the Women in Science and Technology International (WSTI) Hall of Fame in June.
"These women do a very good job at what they do, and they have been very encouraging to other women in the science and technology community," said Sheryl Root, a WSTI board member.
Professor Dresselhaus is a leading researcher of carbon-related materials at MIT. She has co-written three books on carbon science and done extensive research on fullerenes -- compounds assembled from carbon atoms in structures resembling geodesic domes -- and on fullerene-related carbon nanotubes.
"These days, women have the concept that they can do things just as well as men," Professor Dresselhaus told the San Jose Mercury News. "I think that [attitude] is something we didn't have 30 years ago."
The other inductees are Dr. Anita Borg, a computer scientist at Xerox Corp.'s Palo Alto Research Center who developed and patented a method for making memory systems faster while working at Digital Equipment Corp. in the 1980s; Gertrude B. Elion, scientist emeritus at Glaxo Wellcome Inc., co-recipient of the 1988 Nobel Prize in medicine; Julie Spicer England, a vice president at Texas Instruments who is co-holder of six patents related to infrared process technology; and Dr. Elinor F. Helin, principal investigator for the Near Earth Asteroid Tracking Program (NEAT), which has discovered a significant number of near-earth objects for the Jet Propulsion Laboratory.
The premiere award for women in science and technology worldwide, the WSTI Hall of Fame was launched in 1996 to recognize, honor and promote outstanding contributions women make to the scientific and technological communities and to society.
A version of this article appeared in MIT Tech Talk on July 15, 1998.
