Aug
28
2025

Sophie Germain – biography

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In Paris, 1776, a young girl named Sophie Germain was born. Mathematics were forbidden to her.
Her family hid her books. At night, they even took away her lamps. But Sophie refused to surrender her passion. She solved equations with a candle candle.
At 18, barred from the new École Polytechnique, Sophie found a way in. She submitted her work under a false name, “Monsieur Leblanc.” Her papers stunned the great mathematician Joseph-Louis Lagrange, who encouraged her even when he discovered she was a woman.
Her greatest challenge came when the Paris Academy of Sciences issued a prize problem: the vibrations of elastic plates. In 1816, she triumphed — becoming the first woman ever to win the Academy’s prize.
She didn’t stop there. Sophie made breakthroughs in number theory. Her name became attached to results still used today: Sophie Germain’s Theorem.
Yet, despite her brilliance, being a woman she could not hold a university post, nor even attend Academy sessions.
Sophie Germain died in 1831, at just 55, her genius never fully recognized. But today, her name endures in theorems, in the Sophie Germain Prize, and even on the surface of Venus, where a crater bears her name.
She proved that no locked door, no extinguished lamp, and no prejudice could silence a mind.