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𝐍𝐈𝐆𝐇𝐓𝐒𝐇𝐀𝐃𝐄 ✩ 𝐝𝐜𝐬𝐭
. ݁⋆. ݁⋆. ݁ ᯓ★ 𝑤ℎ𝑒𝑛 𝑖𝑠𝑎𝑏𝑒𝑙𝑙𝑎 𝑤𝑒𝑖𝑛𝑏𝑒𝑟𝑔 𝑓𝑖𝑛𝑎𝑙𝑙𝑦 ℎ𝑒𝑙𝑝𝑠 ℎ𝑢𝑚𝑎𝑛𝑖𝑡𝑦 𝑎𝑠 𝑚𝑜𝑟𝑒 𝑡ℎ𝑎𝑛 𝑗𝑢𝑠𝑡 𝑎𝑛 𝑒𝑛𝑡𝑒𝑟𝑡𝑎𝑖𝑛𝑒𝑟, 𝑎𝑛𝑑 𝑡𝑟𝑖𝑒𝑠 𝑡𝑜 𝑛𝑜𝑡 𝑝𝑢𝑠ℎ 𝑢𝑝 𝑑𝑎𝑖𝑠𝑖𝑒𝑠 𝑖𝑛 𝑡ℎ𝑒 𝑝𝑟𝑜𝑐𝑒𝑠𝑠
ᯓ★ 𝑜𝑟
. ݁⋆. ݁⋆. ݁ ᯓ★ 𝑤ℎ𝑒𝑛 𝑡ℎ𝑒 𝑤ℎ𝑜𝑙𝑒 𝑤𝑜𝑟𝑙𝑑 𝑔𝑜𝑡 𝑠𝑡𝑜𝑛𝑒𝑑
━━ ☾ 𖤓 ⚘ ✩ 「♪」 ✩ ⚘ 𖤓 ☽ ━━
♪ 𝐓𝐇𝐄 𝑶𝑭𝑭𝑰𝑪𝑰𝑨𝑳 𝐓𝐑𝐀𝐂𝐊𝐋𝐈𝐒𝐓 ♪
𝟷 ✩ 𝐭𝐡𝐞 𝐬𝐭𝐚𝐫 𝐚𝐧𝐝 𝐭𝐡𝐞 𝐬𝐜𝐢𝐞𝐧𝐭𝐢𝐬𝐭
𝟸 ✩ 𝐭𝐡𝐞 𝐝𝐞𝐯𝐢𝐥 𝐲𝗼𝐮 𝐤𝐧𝗼𝐰
𝟹 ✩ 𝗼𝐡 𝗺𝐲 𝐬𝐭𝐚𝐫𝐬!
𝟺 ✩ 𝐬𝐞𝐭 𝐢𝐧 𝐬𝐭𝗼𝐧𝐞
𝟻 ✩ 𝐩𝐫𝐢𝐧𝐜𝐞𝐬𝐬 𝐩𝐞𝐚𝐜𝐡
𝟼 ✩ 𝐚𝐜𝐭 𝐈
𝟽 ✩ 𝐜𝗼𝐝𝐞: 𝐧𝐢𝐠𝐡𝐭𝐬𝐡𝐚𝐝𝐞
━━ ☾ 𖤓 ⚘ ✩ 「♪」 ✩ ⚘ 𖤓 ☽ ━━
𝑖'𝑚 𝑗𝑢𝑠𝑡 𝑏𝑒𝑔𝑖𝑛𝑛𝑖𝑛𝑔 𝑡𝑜 𝑡𝑟𝑎𝑛𝑠𝑓𝑒𝑟 𝑡ℎ𝑖𝑠 𝑠𝑡𝑜𝑟𝑦 𝑡𝑜 𝑡𝑢𝑚𝑏𝑙𝑟, 𝑏𝑢𝑡 𝑎𝑙𝑙 𝑐ℎ𝑎𝑝𝑡𝑒𝑟𝑠 𝑎𝑟𝑒 𝑐𝑢𝑟𝑟𝑒𝑛𝑡𝑙𝑦 𝑝𝑢𝑏𝑙𝑖𝑠ℎ𝑒𝑑 ℎ𝑒𝑟𝑒 𝑖𝑓 𝑦𝑜𝑢'𝑑 𝑙𝑖𝑘𝑒 𝑡𝑜 𝑟𝑒𝑎𝑑 𝑡ℎ𝑒𝑚 𝑛𝑜𝑤 ꨄ
𝑐𝑜𝑣𝑒𝑟 𝑏𝑦 𝐹𝑟𝑒𝑐𝑘𝑙𝑒𝑠_𝑎𝑛𝑑_𝐹𝑎𝑒𝑠 𝑜𝑛 𝑤𝑎𝑡𝑡𝑝𝑎𝑑
𝟷 ✩ 𝐭𝐡𝐞 𝐬𝐭𝐚𝐫 𝐚𝐧𝐝 𝐭𝐡𝐞 𝐬𝐜𝐢𝐞𝐧𝐭𝐢𝐬𝐭
cw: mentions of underage drinking • very brief mentions of throwing up/dealing with hangover • senku not getting paid enough for this stuff </3
third person pov • june 3rd 2019 • 12:48 pm
SUN SHONE through the glass door and the sheer green curtains covering it. Light bathed the tidied living room in a soft afternoon glow, easy enough on the eyes to sleep comfortably.
Not that Isabella really needed help with that, she was a heavy sleeper.
On the couch is where her physically exhausted body lay, unconscious to the world around her. She'd had a long night the previous day, what with her concert and the after-party following it.
The show went off without any problems, which was always appreciated by the young performer. The after-party, however.. was a slightly different story. It was also an additional reason the prima donna was so knocked out.
Keys jangled in the front door, before unlocking and allowing it to be opened. Immediately after, a younger boy let himself in, spotting the superstar spilled all over his sofa.
He sighed and shook his head. Sometimes, she was ten billion percent annoying. Luckily for her, she wasn't totally a dumb blonde, like some in the world painted her out to be. He still called her that to tease her, of course.
But really, the sixteen-year-old had simply made a few choices her older sister wouldn't approve of.
Tearing his wired red eyes away from the softly snoring girl, he moved to the kitchen and quickly concocted something he'd researched about last night.
Because if there was one thing to know about Senku Ishigami, it's his abundant knowledge. He'd always put it to use one way or another.
Though, he would roll his eyes if anyone fawned over the fact he knew his roommate would have a raging hangover today.
Given his front row seat of last night's antics, it was the most obvious thing in the world.
So to that end, he finished the rather gross elixir and waltzed over to the couch. The young scientist analyzed her passed out self, almost chuckling at the fact that Bella still resided in her sparkly concert attire from yesterday.
Senku vividly remembered how the doorknob rattled at around one in the morning. He'd been working on this mind boggling phenomenon with petrified birds, until a fidgeting noise broke him from his thoughts.
He curiously looked outside of his room, before heading to the front entrance and looking through the peephole.
And there she was—Isabella Weinberg: America's little darling, back against the second floor railing, laughing to herself.
"Never a dull moment with you, huh?" he murmured to himself while opening the door.
Immediately, this made her smile widely at him from the ground where she sat.
"Hey! Y'got the door open!" she cheered in a tone too loud for the hour it was.
Senku snickered and knelt in front of her, easily smelling the alcohol, but asking anyways, "Are you drunk, Dawn?"
Dawn: a nickname that's a play on her middle name.
Another giggle bubbled from her glossed up lips as she shook her head childishly. "Noo, Lilly and I agreed I wouldn't drink until—" hiccup, "I'm twenty!"
Senku, for good reason, didn't believe her. This moved him to eye the dolled-up (and slightly disheveled) girl from head to toe. That's when his observant irises caught the lavender colored paper sticking out of her purse.
He grabbed it and she gasped, not aware it was even planted on her. "Woah Senku! Did you just do a magic trick..?! I didn't know you knew magic..?"
He ignored her for a moment while reading the letter.
'Hello bella's friend~ this is from bella's other friend. She said you'd take care of her so I dropped her off here. Apparently she didn't realize her drinks had alcohol in them until she was already a smidge tipsy, oopsie! Anywhooo, you two have fun!'
Senku rolled his eyes after finishing the note, pushing Bel's warm forehead back with his palm as she tried to glance at the words.
And then his gaze caught the additional message at the bottom.
'P.S. she's quite the affectionate drunk, so keep yourself safe~ ꨄ'
As if on cue, she sighed and wrapped both her arms around the younger boy's neck, bringing him into a too-close-for-comfort hug.
"Senkuuu, you're so cool," Bella gushed, burying her face into his neck. "I mean—you're totally a huge nerd and it's super funny. But like, you're also just so cool."
With another small gasp—sounding as if she was Columbus discovering America—the smaller girl pulled back. Not fully though, as she put her hands on his shoulders to keep them nearly nose to nose.
"And cute!"
He was understanding, but that made him scrunch up his face more than the hug did.
"Oh, but um, Rocket Man…" She lowered her voice into a loud whisper now, cupping her lips with one hand. "When you open your mouth it makes you a liiittle scary to some people because you have like—no filter."
He blinked, face deadpan while looking at the Texas born star.
"Right, I'm the one with no filter," he sighed softly as he fought off a smile.
Another thing about Senku Ishigami: he was never good at fighting. Not without a weapon of science at his hands.
And seeing as the only thing in arms reach was the girl that'd been living with him for a few days, he rolled his eyes, smirk tugging in the corner as he pulled her to her feet.
"Come on, idiot," he snickered in that evil way he always did. "You're going to be so embarrassed tomorrow."
Senku walked the younger Weinberg sister inside with her arm over his gangly shoulder. But after a second, he realized he wasn't breaking a sweat, making his analytical mind act up when he side-eyed her.
"Jeez Bell, what diet does your manager have you on now? You weigh like two kilograms."
"Okay. So. I'm American, right? And I think I may be drunk, so," she slurred her words right before she tripped in her glittery platforms, tumbling to the ground.
Senku had tried to catch her, but she slipped through his fingers in an instant.
Groaning and laying her head back on the Ishigami's floor, Bella slung an arm over her closed eyes.
"M'too tired to use the metric thingy.. just speak American to me please," she mumbled in a slight whine.
"You mean English?"
"English? I'm not British, Gami..? But I do like their accents—oh! And their TV shows."
Senku's expression once again went deadpan as he stared dumbfounded at the girl who was literally bleeding from a cut on her lip—thanks to the fall—and yet was rattling off her favorite British series.
Doctor Who and Downton Abbey, apparently.
A heavy sigh left the unique-haired boy as he pulled out his phone to research hangover cures in a hurry.
Glancing back to the suddenly snoring starlet, his intuition told him this was just the calm before the storm.
"This is gonna be a long night."
And it was.
Given the fact that she woke up an hour later to puke was bad enough. Thankfully Senku put a bucket by the couch he'd managed to drag her onto. But then, when Bella was slightly more alert, she made him help her remove her smudged makeup.
It had to be done before it 'ruined her skin forever' as she put it, begging for his help. Only threatening Senku with smothering him in affection kicked the unorthodox boy into high gear as he wiped her makeup off.
After that, like the mouse who was given a cookie, she also asked him to get her tooth brush and bring it to her on the couch. She could take an everything shower tomorrow, but that needed to be dealt with ASAP.
He did so, because he's a deceptively decent person, but it wasn't without rolling his eyes and getting onto her. Namely for being irresponsible and not asking what the after-party's drinks were made of before consuming them.
Then finally, with some mildly embarrassing declarations of platonic love for the scientist, she passed out again.
Until now.
It was half past noon and time for a rude awakening.
Senku gently put the dark and lethal-looking drink on the coffee table, followed by picking up the two small saucepans next to the glass.
He smirked and shrugged a shoulder up to make sure his necessary earplugs were firmly in place, when finally—
CLANK! CLANK! CLANK! CLANK!
A sharp gasp came from Bella, who instantly shot awake in shock at the eardrum-slaughtering noises.
The sudden movement caused her to fall from the couch entirely, landing on her face for the second time in twenty-four hours.
"What the—where am—?!" she stopped.
Upon pushing herself onto her knees and recognizing the familiar floor (along with the cackling laughs of a mad scientist) Bell's expression darkened.
Slowly turning her head to the teenager clutching his stomach from the fit of laughter, Bella looked deadly as the boy's beloved hydrofluoric acid.
"Senku Ishigami—I swear on my mother's grave, once I get my hearing back I'll be fixin' to ring your little neck!"
Wiping a tear from his scarlet eyes, the fifteen-year-old in question yanked the insidious mystery drink from the coffee table and shoved it in her face.
"Yeah yeah, you say that, but if you kill me now then who'll drag your sorry self to space in a few years, eh?"
Furrowed brows accompanied a suspicious look on Bella's face.
"Is that poison..? 'Cus it sure-fire looks like poison."
Senku rolled his eyes at her southern toned doubts.
"Yes, I'm going to poison one of the few people who go to science exhibits with me and understand over half of what's going on. That sounds like such a logical and beneficial idea!"
His sarcasm and fake smile were definitely off the charts with that one.
"No, you dumb blonde," he dropped the act, flicking her now normal temperature forehead. "It's a mixture of things that'll ten billion percent eliminate the hangover that I know you have."
Senku then swiped two pills off the table and put them in her hand. He finally rested his hands on his hips, a confidence she'd grown used to radiating from him.
"Pair that drink with four-hundred milligrams of ibuprofen and you'll be sure to send that hangover straight to hell," he assured darkly, making Bella look down at her open palm.
Scoffing lightly, the olivine-eyed girl glanced back up at him through her untamed bangs.
"Y'couldn't have done this without the pans, huh?" Bell chuckled, momentarily ignoring the debilitating pain in her head. "You just had to be somewhat annoying because heaven forbid you—"
"Hi, yeah, that's cool—can you chug the drink already? I mean I know you can, given your state last night," Senku cut in, snickering at his own dig.
Continuing with a pinky in his ear, he sardonically sucked in air through his teeth. "But I'm kindaaa on a time crunch here, gotta be back at school in ten minutes. Not all of us are high-school drop outs, y'know?"
"Hey! I got my G.E.D. thank you very much," the world traveler defended her early leave from formal education.
She's still very studious of course, and Senku knows that. He really likes that about her, and in fact, she was studying medical science the day they met, a little over a year ago.
But that's not going to stop him from taking jabs at her any chance he gets, no way! Where's the fun in that?
Sniffing the greenish-brown liquid, Bella had to hold back a gag as she eyed the expectant Senku.
"Do I even want to know what's in here?"
He thought about her question for a moment, holding his chin in a fake ponderous air.
"Probably not," he concluded with a shrug, before grinning mischievously and joining Bella on the floor. "But I'll tell you anyways!"
Sitting criss-crossed in front of her, Senku leaned forward to the girl who wasn't prepared for a passionate nerd spiel this soon after waking up.
"The drink is a mix of coconut water for electrolytes, spinach for magnesium, ginger for nausea relief, banana for potassium, lemon juice for detox," he rattled off, raising each finger with every new ingredient.
"Then I added honey for energy, apple cider vinegar for digestion, parsley as a diuretic, and yogurt for probiotics. It's basically a scientifically balanced hangover cure!"
He was clearly proud of his creation—disgusting as the drink sounded—so Bella could only give a resigned sigh.
As she looked back down at what might be waste product from a witch's cauldron, the southern belle shivered. "I think you forgot to add the part where you sprinkled in eye of newt, Sen."
"Oh come on, just pretend it's Dom Pérignon—which is what I'm assuming is your new favorite drink, yeah?"
He smirked as she gave him a pointed look that didn't hold any real anger.
"You're never letting me live last night down, are you?"
"You called me cute, dude," he emphasized, laughing while crossing his arms, leaning further forward with a smirk. "So no—not even if Hell froze over."
"I was afraid’a that.."
Sighing melodramatically, the folk-pop sensation took a brave and hesitant sip of it, nearly throwing up (again) after the first two drops of it breached her esophagus.
Luckily for both parties, she kept it down and was able to down the whole glass in one go.
Placing the cup on the table, Bella wiped her mouth with a scrunched up face at the disgusting drink.
"If that doesn't work I'm so sabotaging your next science project."
Senku snorted out a laugh as he rose to his feet. "Trust me, will you? By the time I get home from school you'll be good as new."
As he made his way to the front door, Isabella didn't even need to see his face to tell what expression came over him. No, his next words and tone painted the picture clearly.
"And then, we'll be pulling an all nighter to figure out why one of those petrified swallows have higher brain activity levels than the others."
He turned around after his shoes were put on, flashing one last devious grin to his roommate.
"This'll be exhilarating, you off-brand Rapunzel—get excited!"
The door shut, and a dark blonde eyebrow raised from the nickname, but for only about two seconds.
A short snicker followed, and Bella rolled her pale green eyes.
"Well ain't that rich coming from a vegetable cosplayer," she breathed out, humor lingering in the expelled carbon dioxide.
It was then, after the Scientist left, that the Star decided to scrape herself off the surprisingly comfortable floor.
As Bells pushed herself up, she decided if she'd passed out here in a drunken haze, that her neck wouldn't have been in much pain.
Although— "Son of a one-legged armadillo! What did I do to my knees?!"
They both had one big square bandage over them. 'Oh,' she thought, looking down at the flooring. 'Didn't I fall on my face last night?'
"Asinine carpet burn.." Bell pouted, sitting on the couch and examining her covered kneecaps. It looked like Senku must've doctored them up.
A knowing grin crept onto her lips for a moment, thinking how he may call her less than flattering nicknames, but at least he shows that he still cares by—
"Wait a second," Bella's brows furrowed as she stood up to look in the mirror hanging above the couch.
Two sage irises widened, seeing a small butterfly style bandage on her busted lip from the night prior.
"Huh, he touched my lips while I was passed out?" she thought aloud, staring at the material before chuckling slightly.
"Eh," the teenager shrugged, unbothered as she plopped back on the couch.
'He's Senku, that nerd's probably never been kissed and couldn't be happier about it. He definitely didn't do anything while I was unconscious.'
Bella then evilly chuckled to herself, rolling over onto the sofa for nap part two. 'And if I find out he did do something, I'll show him exactly what we do to smarmy weasels in Texas.'
Oh, and by the way, if there's one thing to know about Isabella Weinberg?
She goes by Bella, and her middle name is Donna.
So, when necessary, she can be just as pretty and all the more poisonous than deadly nightshade itself.
But we'll digress for now; more on Ms. Belladonna later.
12:59 pm • june 3rd 2019 • to be continued
. ☾ 。.・✩・. 𝑵𝑰𝑮𝑯𝑻𝑺𝑯𝑨𝑫𝑬・✩・゜・☽ .
hello and welcome! my name's logan, nice to meetcha <3
this is my first time writing for dr stone since 2021, and with season 4 in progress, i have to admit the hyper fixation is back and defffinitely stronger than before, so buckle up!
i have sooo much planned, (already evil giggling) i really am exhilarated AND excited
anywho, hopefully this first chapter was fun and this book will be something y'all will enjoy ｡ﾟ(ﾟ´ω`ﾟ)ﾟ｡
lastly, here is the story's pinterest board and spotify playlist for anyone interested
alrighty that's all i got for everyone today, stay safe, stay street, and i'll catch you later! ☆〜（ゝ。∂）
♪ 2902 words, end of chapter ♪
'You could be my entire world if you let me.'
When I say I loved love, theoretically...
I FREAKING LOVED IT!!! ❤❤❤
I read this in 2024 and still till this day it's one of my favorite reads ever. Probably because I related so much to Elsie that I even bought a sweater with the quote that is written in this post (the sweater is beautiful tho).
This art is from: @maherdraws
The sweater (if someone wants to buy it) @literaturestitches
Some extra favorite quotes:
'I like to see you. When you're not trying to be someone else.'
'I want you Elsie. All the time. I think of you. All. The. F**king. Time.'
'There is no universe in which I'm not going to let you go. I want to he with you, on you, every second of the day.'
The STEM major isn't STEMing 😾
Until I started passing as a cis man, I didn't realize how horribly I was treated compared to them. Yes, I struggle being trans, but my life has improved significantly in how I'm treated by those who assume I'm cisgender. I honestly feel privileged that I get to experience both ends of the spectrum because I'm able to share just how drastic the change is.
things that happened to me when i was a woman in STEM:
an advisor humiliated me in front of an entire lab group because of a call I made in his place when he wouldn't reply to my e-mails for months
he later delegated part of my master's thesis work to a 19-year old male undergrad without my approval
a male scientist at a NASA conference looked me up and down and asked when i was graduating and if i was open to a job at his company. right before inquiring what my ethnicity was because i "looked exotic"
a random male member of the public began talking over me and my female advisor, an oceanographer with a pHD and decades of experience, saying he knew more about oceanography than us
things that have happened to me since becoming a man in STEM:
being asked consistently for advice on projects despite being completely new to a position
male colleagues approaching me to drop candid information regarding our partners / higher ups that I was not privy to before
lenience toward my work in a way I haven't experienced before. incredible understanding when I need to take time off to care for my family.
conference rooms go silent when I start talking. no side chatter. I get a baseline level of attention and focus from people that's very unfamiliar and genuinely difficult for me to wrap my head around.
like. yes some PI's will still be assholes regardless of the gender of their subordinates but, I've lived this transition. misogyny in STEM is killing women's careers, and trans men can and do experience male privilege.
When I told my relatives that I’m an engineering major, they basically freaked out and nagged about how as a female, I shouldn’t pick something so “macho” and that I wouldn’t be able to handle the workload. The same thing happened to my female classmates.
One factor that influences the use of the labels “soft science” or “hard science” is gender bias, according to recent research my colleagues and I conducted.
Women’s participation varies across STEM disciplines. While women have nearly reached gender parity in biomedical sciences, they still make up only about 18% of students receiving undergraduate degrees in computer science, for instance.
In a series of experiments, we varied the information study participants read about women’s representation in fields like chemistry, sociology and biomedical sciences. We then asked them to categorize these fields as either a “soft science” or a “hard science.”
Across studies, participants were consistently more likely to describe a discipline as a “soft science” when they’d been led to believe that proportionally more women worked in the field. Moreover, the “soft science” label led people to devalue these fields—describing them as less rigorous, less trustworthy and less deserving of federal research funding.
Continue Reading.
i ACTUALLY hate stem why can i not enjoy cute stuff like history 💔
LaRue Burbank, mathematician and computer, is just one of the many women who were instrumental to NASA missions.
4 Little Known Women Who Made Huge Contributions to NASA
Women have always played a significant role at NASA and its predecessor NACA, although for much of the agency’s history, they received neither the praise nor recognition that their contributions deserved. To celebrate Women’s History Month – and properly highlight some of the little-known women-led accomplishments of NASA’s early history – our archivists gathered the stories of four women whose work was critical to NASA’s success and paved the way for future generations.
LaRue Burbank: One of the Women Who Helped Land a Man on the Moon
LaRue Burbank was a trailblazing mathematician at NASA. Hired in 1954 at Langley Memorial Aeronautical Laboratory (now NASA’s Langley Research Center), she, like many other young women at NACA, the predecessor to NASA, had a bachelor's degree in mathematics. But unlike most, she also had a physics degree. For the next four years, she worked as a "human computer," conducting complex data analyses for engineers using calculators, slide rules, and other instruments. After NASA's founding, she continued this vital work for Project Mercury.
In 1962, she transferred to the newly established Manned Spacecraft Center (now NASA’s Johnson Space Center) in Houston, becoming one of the few female professionals and managers there. Her expertise in electronics engineering led her to develop critical display systems used by flight controllers in Mission Control to monitor spacecraft during missions. Her work on the Apollo missions was vital to achieving President Kennedy's goal of landing a man on the Moon.
Eilene Galloway: How NASA became… NASA
Eilene Galloway wasn't a NASA employee, but she played a huge role in its very creation. In 1957, after the Soviet Union launched Sputnik, Senator Richard Russell Jr. called on Galloway, an expert on the Atomic Energy Act, to write a report on the U.S. response to the space race. Initially, legislators aimed to essentially re-write the Atomic Energy Act to handle the U.S. space goals. However, Galloway argued that the existing military framework wouldn't suffice – a new agency was needed to oversee both military and civilian aspects of space exploration. This included not just defense, but also meteorology, communications, and international cooperation.
Her work on the National Aeronautics and Space Act ensured NASA had the power to accomplish all these goals, without limitations from the Department of Defense or restrictions on international agreements. Galloway is even to thank for the name "National Aeronautics and Space Administration", as initially NASA was to be called “National Aeronautics and Space Agency” which was deemed to not carry enough weight and status for the wide-ranging role that NASA was to fill.
Barbara Scott: The “Star Trek Nerd” Who Led Our Understanding of the Stars
A self-described "Star Trek nerd," Barbara Scott's passion for space wasn't steered toward engineering by her guidance counselor. But that didn't stop her! Fueled by her love of math and computer science, she landed at Goddard Spaceflight Center in 1977. One of the first women working on flight software, Barbara's coding skills became instrumental on missions like the International Ultraviolet Explorer (IUE) and the Thermal Canister Experiment on the Space Shuttle's STS-3. For the final decade of her impressive career, Scott managed the flight software for the iconic Hubble Space Telescope, a testament to her dedication to space exploration.
Dr. Claire Parkinson: An Early Pioneer in Climate Science Whose Work is Still Saving Lives
Dr. Claire Parkinson's love of math blossomed into a passion for climate science. Inspired by the Moon landing, and the fight for civil rights, she pursued a graduate degree in climatology. In 1978, her talents landed her at Goddard, where she continued her research on sea ice modeling. But Parkinson's impact goes beyond theory. She began analyzing satellite data, leading to a groundbreaking discovery: a decline in Arctic sea ice coverage between 1973 and 1987. This critical finding caught the attention of Senator Al Gore, highlighting the urgency of climate change.
Parkinson's leadership extended beyond research. As Project Scientist for the Aqua satellite, she championed making its data freely available. This real-time information has benefitted countless projects, from wildfire management to weather forecasting, even aiding in monitoring the COVID-19 pandemic. Parkinson's dedication to understanding sea ice patterns and the impact of climate change continues to be a valuable resource for our planet.
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It’s Girl Scout Day! March 12, 2024, is the 112th birthday of Girl Scouts in the United States, and to celebrate, we’re sharing a lithograph of the Girl Scout alumnae who became NASA astronauts.
Girl Scouts learn to work together, build community, embrace adventurousness and curiosity, and develop leadership skills—all of which come in handy as an astronaut. For example, former Scouts Christina Koch and Jessica Meir worked together to make history on Oct. 18, 2019, when they performed the first all-woman spacewalk.
Pam Melroy is one of only two women to command a space shuttle and became NASA’s deputy administrator on June 21, 2021.
Nicole Mann was the first Indigenous woman from NASA to go to space when she launched to the International Space Station on Oct. 5, 2022. Currently, Loral O’Hara is aboard the space station, conducting science experiments and research.
Participating in thoughtful activities in leadership and STEM in Girl Scouts has empowered and inspired generations of girls to explore space, and we can’t wait to meet the future generations who will venture to the Moon and beyond.
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Nora AlMatrooshi
Nora AlMatrooshi, the first Emirati woman astronaut, worked as a piping engineer before becoming an astronaut candidate for the United Arab Emirates. https://mbrsc.ae/team/nora/
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Deniz Burnham
A former NASA intern, Deniz Burnham started her career as an engineer on an oil rig in Prudhoe Bay, Alaska, and went on to lead operations on drilling rigs in Canada, Ohio, and Texas. https://go.nasa.gov/3wDpfBo
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Chris Birch
After an academic career at U.C. Riverside and Caltech, Chris Birch became a track cyclist on the U.S. National Team. She was training for the 2020 Olympics when she was chosen as an astronaut candidate. https://go.nasa.gov/49WJKHj
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Nichole Ayers
Nichole Ayers was born in San Diego but considers Colorado her home. A major in the U.S. Air Force, Ayers led the first-ever all-woman F-22 formation in combat in 2019. https://go.nasa.gov/3IqAyzw
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And that’s a wrap! Thank you for all the great questions. We hope you learned a little bit about what it takes to work in mission control as a flight director.
If you’re hungry for more, you can read the latest installment of our First Woman graphic novel series, where fictional character Commander Callie Rodriguez embarks on the next phase of her trailblazing journey and leaves the Moon to take the helm at Mission Control.
Keep up with the flight directors, the Space Station, and the Artemis missions at the links below.
Flight directors: X
Artemis: Facebook: Facebook, Instagram, X
Space Station: Facebook, Instagram, X (@Space_Station), X( @ISS_Research)
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What encouraging words would you say to girls and women with dreams and ambitions who live in oppressive environments?
What do films and TV get wrong about your job the most?
out of all the roles you've had in the past, which one do you feel has best prepared you to be a flight director?
How did you get to where you are now? and di you always know that this is where you wanted to end up?
Tumblr, this is Houston speaking! The flight directors Answer Time with Chloe Mehring and Diane Dailey is live. Stay tuned to learn about what happens in mission control, how to become a flight director, and what Hollywood sometimes gets wrong about the job. View ALL the answers HERE.
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What’s It Like to Work in NASA’s Mission Control Center?
In the latest installment of our First Woman graphic novel series, we see Commander Callie Rodriguez embark on the next phase of her trailblazing journey, as she leaves the Moon to take the helm at Mission Control.
Flight directors work in Mission Control to oversee operations of the International Space Station and Artemis missions to the Moon. They have a unique, overarching perspective focused on integration between all the systems that make a mission a success – flight directors have to learn a little about a lot.
Diane Dailey and Chloe Mehring were selected as flight directors in 2021. They’ll be taking your questions about what it’s like to lead teams of flight controllers, engineers, and countless professionals, both agencywide and internationally, in an Answer Time session on Nov. 28, 2023, from noon to 1 p.m. EST (9-10 a.m. PST) here on our Tumblr!
Like Callie, how did their unique backgrounds and previous experience, prepare them for this role? What are they excited about as we return to the Moon?
🚨 Ask your questions now by visiting https://nasa.tumblr.com/ask.
Diane Dailey started her career at NASA in 2006 in the space station Environmental Control and Life Support Systems (ECLSS) group. As an ECLSS flight controller, she logged more than 1,700 hours of console time, supported 10 space shuttle missions, and led the ECLSS team. She transitioned to the Integration and System Engineering (ISE) group, where she was the lead flight controller for the 10th and 21st Commercial Resupply Services missions for SpaceX. In addition, she was the ISE lead for NASA’s SpaceX Demo-1 and Demo-2 crew spacecraft test flights. Dailey was also a capsule communicator (Capcom) controller and instructor.
She was selected as a flight director in 2021 and chose her call sign of “Horizon Flight” during her first shift in November of that year. She has since served as the Lead Flight director for the ISS Expedition 68, led the development of a contingency spacewalk, and led a spacewalk in June to install a new solar array on the space station. She is currently working on development of the upcoming Artemis II mission and the Human Lander Systems which will return humanity to the moon. Dailey was raised in Lubbock, Texas, and graduated from Texas A&M University in College Station with a bachelor’s degree in biomedical engineering. She is married and a mother of two. She enjoys cooking, traveling, and spending time outdoors.
Chloe Mehring started her NASA career in 2008 in the Flight Operations’ propulsion systems group and supported 11 space shuttle missions. She served as propulsion support officer for Exploration Flight Test-1, the first test flight of the Orion spacecraft that will be used for Artemis missions to the Moon. Mehring was also a lead NASA propulsion officer for SpaceX’s Crew Dragon spacecraft and served as backup lead for the Boeing Starliner spacecraft. She was accepted into the 2021 Flight Director class and worked her first shift in February 2022, taking on the call sign “Lion Flight”. Since becoming certified, she has worked over 100 shifts, lead the NG-17 cargo resupply mission team, and executed two United States spacewalks within 10 days of each other. She became certified as a Boeing Starliner Flight Director, sat console for the unmanned test flight in May 2022 (OFT-2) and will be leading the undock team for the first crewed mission on Starliner in the spring of next year. She originally is from Mifflinville, Pennsylvania, and graduated with a bachelor’s degree in aerospace engineering from The Pennsylvania State University in State College. She is a wife, a mom to one boy, and she enjoys fitness, cooking and gardening.
Commander Callie Continues Moon Mission in NASA’s Second Graphic Novel
You followed fictional astronaut, Callie Rodriguez, on her journey to the Moon in our First Woman graphic novel, “Issue No. 1: From Dream to Reality.”
In the brand new “Issue No. 2: Expanding our Universe,” find out how Callie and her robotic sidekick RT escape the lunar lava tunnel and what challenges await them on the lunar surface.
See Callie and her new crewmates work together as a team and navigate the unexpected as they take on a challenging mission to deploy a next-generation telescope on the far side of the Moon. Now available digitally in English at nasa.gov/CallieFirst and in Spanish at nasa.gov/PrimeraMujer!
Along with the new chapter, the First Woman app – available in the Apple and Google Play stores – has been updated with new immersive, extended reality content. Explore the lunar surface and learn about the real technologies we’re building to make living and working on the Moon – and eventually, Mars – possible.
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Cosmic Alphabet Soup: Classifying Stars
If you’ve spent much time stargazing, you may have noticed that while most stars look white, some are reddish or bluish. Their colors are more than just pretty – they tell us how hot the stars are. Studying their light in greater detail can tell us even more about what they’re like, including whether they have planets. Two women, Williamina Fleming and Annie Jump Cannon, created the system for classifying stars that we use today, and we’re building on their work to map out the universe.
By splitting starlight into spectra – detailed color patterns that often feature lots of dark lines – using a prism, astronomers can figure out a star’s temperature, how long it will burn, how massive it is, and even how big its habitable zone is. Our Sun’s spectrum looks like this:
Astronomers use spectra to categorize stars. Starting at the hottest and most massive, the star classes are O, B, A, F, G (like our Sun), K, M. Sounds like cosmic alphabet soup! But the letters aren’t just random – they largely stem from the work of two famous female astronomers.
Williamina Fleming, who worked as one of the famous “human computers” at the Harvard College Observatory starting in 1879, came up with a way to classify stars into 17 different types (categorized alphabetically A-Q) based on how strong the dark lines in their spectra were. She eventually classified more than 10,000 stars and discovered hundreds of cosmic objects!
That was back before they knew what caused the dark lines in spectra. Soon astronomers discovered that they’re linked to a star’s temperature. Using this newfound knowledge, Annie Jump Cannon – one of Fleming’s protégés – rearranged and simplified stellar classification to include just seven categories (O, B, A, F, G, K, M), ordered from highest to lowest temperature. She also classified more than 350,000 stars!
Type O stars are both the hottest and most massive in the new classification system. These giants can be a thousand times bigger than the Sun! Their lifespans are also around 1,000 times shorter than our Sun’s. They burn through their fuel so fast that they only live for around 10 million years. That’s part of the reason they only make up a tiny fraction of all the stars in the galaxy – they don’t stick around for very long.
As we move down the list from O to M, stars become progressively smaller, cooler, redder, and more common. Their habitable zones also shrink because the stars aren’t putting out as much energy. The plus side is that the tiniest stars can live for a really long time – around 100 billion years – because they burn through their fuel so slowly.
Astronomers can also learn about exoplanets – worlds that orbit other stars – by studying starlight. When a planet crosses in front of its host star, different kinds of molecules in the planet’s atmosphere absorb certain wavelengths of light.
By spreading the star’s light into a spectrum, astronomers can see which wavelengths have been absorbed to determine the exoplanet atmosphere’s chemical makeup. Our James Webb Space Telescope will use this method to try to find and study atmospheres around Earth-sized exoplanets – something that has never been done before.
Our upcoming Nancy Grace Roman Space Telescope will study the spectra from entire galaxies to build a 3D map of the cosmos. As light travels through our expanding universe, it stretches and its spectral lines shift toward longer, redder wavelengths. The longer light travels before reaching us, the redder it becomes. Roman will be able to see so far back that we could glimpse some of the first stars and galaxies that ever formed.
Learn more about how Roman will study the cosmos in our other posts:
Roman’s Family Portrait of Millions of Galaxies
New Rose-Colored Glasses for Roman
How Gravity Warps Light
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Questions coming up from….
@teamadamsperret: Congrats on your PhD!! When people ask what you do, what's your reply?
@Anonymous: How does it feel, working in NASA?
@moonlighy: How did you find your love for this job?
@redbullanddepression: what the prettiest star in the sky in your opinion? also, you are a great role model as a queer woman who is attending university next year to major in aerospace engineering!!!
Will it take pictures of Pluto?
Concerning the new telescope -out of curiosity- what is the maximum distance it can view planets, galaxies, objects, anything up to -in terms of common/metric measurement, and/or years (if applicable) etc.? -Rose
Questions coming up from….
@maybeinanotherworld: JWST IS HAPPENING! How are all of you feeling about this?
@Anonymous: How powerful is this telescope, exactly?
@Anonymous: Why are the mirrors on it yellow?
@foeofcolor: How long is this estimated to last for? Like how long will it be able to function in space by estimates?
Who's ready to #UnfoldTheUniverse? The James Webb Space Telescope Answer Time with expert Dr. Naomi Rowe-Gurney is LIVE! Stay tuned for talks about the science goals, capabilities, and hopes for the world's most powerful telescope. View ALL the answers HERE.
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That’s a wrap! Thank you for all the fantastic questions!
Recent University of Idaho graduate Hannah Johnson and NASA’s STEM on Station activity Manager Becky Kamas answered your questions about our Student Payload Opportunity with Citizen Science (SPOCS).
Checkout their full Answer Time.
SPOCS helps fund student experiments and launches them to the International Space Station to conduct research. Learn more about SPOCS and this year’s student teams building experiments for space HERE.
If today’s Answer Time got you fired up, HERE are other ways you can get involved with NASA as a student. We have contests, challenges, internships, games, and more!
Make sure to follow us on Tumblr for your regular dose of space: http://nasa.tumblr.com.
Questions coming up from….
@monicagellar: Is it open for international students?
@Anonymous: How should high school students get involved?
@Anonymous: Can I apply if my subjects are physics and chemistry in college
@unsuspicious-nobody: Do you have plans to repeat this/do something similar for students in the future?