Nicole R. Lepaute
French Mathematician
1723 – 1788 A.D.

Nicole Reine Lapaute, a French mathematician. In 1748 she married the celebrated mechanician [sic] and clockmaker [sic], Jean André Lepaute, and was the principal author of his Traité d’horlogerie (1775).

In 1757 she assisted Clairant and Lalande in calculating the attraction of Jupiter and Saturn on the comet predicted by Halley. Lalande acknowledged her services in his Théorie des Cométes, and Babinet likewise rendered justice to her genius.

From 1754 to 1759 she edited La Connaissance des Temps, an astronomical annual of the Academy of Sciences. She also wrote other scientific works, and was regarded as one of the most learned women of her time.

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Reference: Famous Women; An Outline of Feminine Achievement Through the Ages With Life Stories of Five Hundred Noted Women By Joseph Adelman. Copyright, 1926 by Ellis M. Lonow Company.