Thelma Austern Estrin
Personal Information
Born: 1924
Died: 2014
Country of Birth: USA
Nationality: USA
Ethnicity: White
Education
CCNY 1941 took classes, no degree; Stevens Institute of Technology 3-month Engineering Assistant course 1942; University of Wisconsin-Madison BS 1948, MS 1949 & PhD 1951 all in Electrical Engineering
"“I was the first woman engineer I ever knew,” (news.wisc.edu); “At school, nobody took me very seriously, , , .But I took myself seriously.” (news.wisc.edu); "
— Thelma Austern Estrin
Professional Life
Field of Study: Electrical Engineering
Institution/Corporation: Columbia Presbyterian Hospital, LA Valley College, University of Wisconsin-Madison, Weizmann Institute of Science, UCLA
Degrees & Memberships: Honorary Degree: University of Wisconsin-Madison (1989); Member: IEEE Engineering in Medicine and Biology Society; Fellow of IEEE, a Fellow of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences, and a Founding Fellow of the American Institute for Medical and Biological Engineering; Board of Trustees of the Aerospace Corporation; Eta Kappa Nu (2000); Society of Women Engineers
Awards & Achievements
Awards: 1963 Fulbright Scholarship; 1984 IEEE Centennial Medal; 1991 IEEE Haraden Pratt Award; Outstanding Engineer of the Year Award, California Institute for the Advancement of Engineering; 1981 Achievement Award, Society of Women Engineers ; 1982 inaugural Service Award, Association for Women in Computing; Superior Accomplishment Award, National Science Foundation; 1979 Outstanding Engineer of the Year Award, California Institute for the Advancement of Engineering; 1999 Women in Technology Hall of Fame;
Achievements: one of the first to apply computer technology to healthcare and medical research; did pioneering work in the fields of expert systems and biomedical engineering; 1954 with husband Gerald helped to design the Weizmann Automatic Computer, or WEIZAC, the first computer in Israel and the Middle East; published a 1996 paper on women’s studies and computer science to discuss the intersections of the two disciplines as they "both evolved as academic disciplines in the 1960s, but they evolved along very different paths."; contributed to developing EMERGE, a first-of-its-kind system to guide emergency room personnel in treating chest pain;
associated with the Brain Research Institute at UCLA in 1960, and organized the Institute's Data Processing Laboratory in 1961
at UCLA designed and developed one of the first analog-to-digital conversion systems that could convert analog signals from electroencephalograms (EEG) to digital signals
retired 1991
is the mother of Deborah & Judith Estrin
1st female VP of IEEE
was hired at the Electroencephalography Department of the Neurological Institute of Columbia Presbyterian Hospital (New York) in November 1951
1975 developed a computer network between UCLA and UC Davis
1982, she took a two-year leave to work at the National Science Foundation as director of the Division of Electrical, Computing and System Engineering
authored dozens of research papers about mapping the brain with computers
later in her career published multiple papers that set forth strategies for attracting and retaining women in the sciences and organized a series of workshops to help women rise to leadership roles
credited her mother with teaching her that women shouldn’t take a back seat