World Intellectual Property Day Quiz

This year’s World Intellectual Property Day focuses on women in innovation in creativity. Take our quiz and see how much you know about the creative and inventive women helping shape our world.

Who is the only person in the world to have won two Nobel prizes for their work in two different fields?

  • Marie Curie
  • Maria Goeppert Mayer
  • Irène Joliot-Curie
  • Ada E. Yonath

Marie Curie won the Nobel Prize for Physics in 1903 and for chemistry in 1911. Thanks to her work we now have radiography and the X-ray.

Which woman is considered by many to have come up with the first computer program?

  • Adele Goldstine
  • Grete Hermann
  • Grace Hopper
  • Ada Lovelace

19th century mathematician Ada Lovelace wrote the data input for a mechanical machine to calculate a sequence of Bernoulli numbers. It took about a century for her to be recognized not only as the first person to foresee the creative potential of computing machines, but also as the first to write what we now consider a computer program.

Established in 2009, Ada Lovelace Day celebrates the achievements of women in science, technology, engineering and math.

Which of the following object(s) was/were invented by a woman:

  • Windscreen wiper
  • Kevlar fiber
  • Long-life nickel hydrogen battery
  • The game of Monopoly
  • The life raft

All of them were invented by women!

Name the 1940s Hollywood actress who invented a remote-controlled torpedo-guidance system?

  • Ava Gardner
  • Katherine Hepburn
  • Hedy Lamarr
  • Ginger Rogers

In the early 1940s, the Hollywood actress, Hedy Lamarr and the modernist composer, George Antheil, worked together to invent a remote-controlled torpedo-guidance system that could not be hacked.

They patented a technology that used rapidly-changing radio signals and gave it to the U.S. Navy. This so-called “frequency-hopping” technology is used in the Wi-Fi, Bluetooth and GPS systems many of us now use every day.

How many women won a Nobel Prize between 1901 and 2017?

  • 26
  • 48
  • 102
  • 284

Of the 585 Noble Prizes granted since 1901, just 48 have been awarded to women.

What did McDonald’s do to mark International Women’s Day in 2018?

  • Spelled out “Happy Women’s Day” in fries in New York’s Times Square
  • Launched the female character “Ronalda McDonald” as a counterpart to Ronald McDonald
  • Developed a Women’s-Day-themed meal
  • Flipped its iconic arch symbol upside-down

For the first time in the brand’s history it “flipped its iconic arches upside-down… [from an “M” to a “W”] in honor of the extraordinary accomplishments of women everywhere,” explained McDonald’s Chief Diversity Officer Wendy Lewis.

Of the below countries, which two have the highest rates of gender parity in international patenting?

  • Belgium
  • China
  • Republic of Korea
  • Spain
  • United States of America

In the Republic of Korea and China 50.3% and 47.9% percent of all international patent applications included women inventors in 2017.

Belgium stood in third place at 35.7%, Spain in fourth at 35.4% and the U.S. in fifth place at 32.9%.

Who was the first female film director to win an Oscar for her work?

  • Haifaa Al Mansour
  • Kathryn Bigelow
  • Jane Campion
  • Claire Denis
  • Ava DuVernay

Kathryn Bigelow made history in 2010 when she became the first woman to win the best director award at the Oscars for her low-budget film, The Hurt Locker.

What is the name of the first Pixar short film directed by a woman?

  • Bao
  • Lifted
  • Lou
  • Presto

The modern-day fairy tale “Bao” is the story of an aging and lonely Chinese mother, who brings to life a very cute pork dumpling. It was directed by Canadian-Chinese film director Domee Shi – the first woman to direct a Pixar short film.

Has a woman ever been to the moon?

No. All of the 12 people to have walked on the moon have been men, according to a BBC report from April 17, 2018. But fifty years ago Russian cosmonaut Valentina Tereshkova did make history by becoming the first woman to travel to space. And it is 40 years since NASA selected its first female astronaut.