Table of Contents Patricia Bath Saves Eyesight through Invention 4 Jagadish Bose Makes Wireless Technology Possible Yvonne Brill Helps Power Rockets into space 8 Grace Hopper Changes Computer Programming 10 Shirley Ann Jackson Advances Telecommunications 12 Katherine Johnson Charts a Course for the Moon 14 Hedy Lamarr Acts to Help the War Effort 16 Lewis Latimer Assists Thomas Edison 18 Jerry Lawson Helps Invent the Video Game Console 20 Ada Lovelace First Computer Programmer 22 Alan Turing Invents the Modern Computer 24 James West Lets People Be Heard 26 Fact Sheet 28 Glossary 30 For More Information 31 Index 32 About the
Patricia Bath Saves Eyesight through Invention Patricia Bath's interest in science different kinds of people She grew up wanting to help people by using came from her mother She encouraged her daughter to read Science and bought her a chemistry set Growing up in the 1940s Bath Patricia's mother was descended had to work hard to get where she from African slaves and Cherokee wanted to go Some people had Indians Patricia heard stories about racist views about black people people all around the world from Many also thought that women had her father He had been a sailor no place in the world of science and and a newspaper columnist These technology But Bath's talent was stories got Patricia interested in all impossible to ignore By the age of 16 she was winning science awards FESTIVAL INNOVATION She chose a career in medicine A WARDS TR BECA ELM VAL and worked her way through school She specialized in working with eye health or ophthalmology In 1974 she became a professor at the University of California Los Angeles She Bath received a was the first woman the in 2012 Tribeca Disruptive ophthalmology Innovation Award which department's recognizes individuals who overcame challenges and history contributed to society TR BE INNOVATIO
Bath developed a new way to remove cataracts Bath began a successful career in Cataract medicine and education But her lasting contribution to the field was an invention In 1981 she had an idea for a new Clear lens Healthy eye type of surgery using lasers These lasers would be used on cataracts A cataract is a condition that affects the lens of the eye Cataracts can cause blurry vision or blindness Lens clouded by cataract Eye with cataract To fix cataracts a machine makes a 30 tiny cut in the eye It then removes the damaged lens Then a new lens is inserted Using a laser the procedure would take only a few minutes Bath designed the new surgery herself but the technology at the time made it impossible It took five years of development Number of years a woman in North Africa had been blind before Bath's device allowed her to see and research Then Bath went to Germany to test it with the most advanced lasers It took a few more years of testing to get a patent It was granted in Bath became interested in science and people at a young age She went to college to study medicine and became an eye doctor She invented a device that uses lasers to cure the United States in 1988 Bath's cataracts device is in worldwide use today She considers it her greatest achievement And restoring sight is her greatest reward The device is in worldwide use and can restore sight to some blind
