Leona Harriet Woods (August 9, 1919 – November 10, 1986) known also as Leona Woods Marshall Libby helped build the first nuclear reactor and atomic bomb. She is #8 in our list of the most remarkable women in nuclear energy/science/technology.

1. She grew up in La Grange, Illinois. She was the second of five children.
2. She received her BS in chemistry from the University of Chicago at the age of 18. She then worked with James Franck and Robert Mulliken (both Nobel prize winners) as a graduate student during WWII on crystallography.
3. Leona graduated with a PhD thesis titled: “On the Silicon Oxide Bands” in 1943. She was the youngest and the last pre-war Mulliken student.
4. In 1942 she started working with Fermi on the Manhattan project as the only female and the youngest member of the team that built and experimented with Chicago Pile-1. She was the only woman present when the reactor went critical. Her main role was the construction and then utilization of Geiger counters for analysis of neutron radiation during the experiments.
5. She had two sons, one was born in 1943 when she was working on the Manhattan project. Fearing that the chief operations would disapprove of her working at the site, she concealed her pregnancy from most of her colleagues by dressing in baggy clothes stuffed with miscellaneous tools.
6. After the war, Leona became a fellow at Fermi’s Institute for Nuclear Studies at the University of Chicago. She worked on determining the refractive index of neutrons for various materials.
7. She later worked at the Institute for Advanced Study in Princeton, New Jersey, the Brookhaven National Laboratory, and New York University, where she became a professor in 1962. Her research involved high-energy physics, astrophysics and cosmology.
8. Leona became interested in ecological and environmental issues, and she devised a method of using the isotope ratios in tree rings to study climate change. She also was a strong advocate for food irradiation.
9. In 1966 she divorced John Marshall, her first husband, and married Willard Libby, Nobel laureate. She became a professor at the University of Colorado.
10. Leona was a prolific author, publishing over 200 scientific papers. Her works include the autobiographical The Uranium People (1979), that contained a history of early atomic research.