Hardy-Ramanujan Number



The man who knew infinity























Achievers

These individuals have been diagnosed with autism spectrum disorder (ASD) and have achieved national and international status in their chosen fields. Click on the image to see a video clip or follow the link to read about their achievements. They have unbelievable skills, unique talents and will add a special innovation to businesses that hire them.

Ramanujan (centre) and his colleague G. H. Hardy (rightmost), with other scientists, outside the Senate House, Cambridge

Srinivasa Ramanujan

The man who wrote volumes of mathematics with almost no formal education had difficulty concentrating on any other subject he had to study when he was in London working with one of the greatest mathematicians of that time, G. H. Hardy. Ramanujan independently compiled nearly 3,900 results (mostly identities and equations) making substantial contributions to mathematical analysis, number theory, infinite series, and continued fractions, including solutions to mathematical problems then considered unsolvable.  

Many were completely novel; his original and highly unconventional results, such as the Ramanujan prime, the Ramanujan theta function, partition formulae, Ramanujan's congruences  and mock theta functions, have opened entire new areas of work and inspired a vast amount of further research. Of his thousands of results, all but a dozen or two have now been proven correct.

Autism Spectrum Disorder

It is believed that Srinivasa Ramanujan FRS (22 December 1887 – 26 April 1920) had ASD as he strongly preferred social isolation, had a single minded focus to pure mathematics in his own ways (leading to a lot of conflict with Prof. Hardy during his stay. There has been a lot of interest in ascertaining the exact nature of the disorder - Asperger's Disorder or Asperger's Syndrome - from his behavioral pattern. However, there have been counter voices too as Simon Mcburney insists - "Ramanujan was quite simply an exceptional human—sharp, funny and absorbed in the parallel universe that was mathematics—but he wasn’t an autistic genius"

Recognitions

Naturally, such a spectacular mathematician - The man who knew infinity - has been recognized and remembered through various means:

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Achievers in India

Step Into My World

Amrit is a young artist on the autism spectrum. She established an incredible connection with colours, patterns and rhythms at an early age. 

 

With little to say in person, Amrit speaks through her paintings with unbridled clarity. The inspiration as always are the common people, the day to day affairs of men and women who we pass by, never sparing a thought or a glimpse.  These unsung characters are transformed into strong, vibrant personas on her canvas.

 

Her sense of composition along with the use of a distinct colour palette touches the soul and transcends the art aficionados into a world of sublime fantasy. 

 

Come, step into her world and see it with her eyes. You will see the difference.


Amrit Khurana: Painter

It’s called simply, To Amrit With Love. The patterns and designs in the four sarees and blouses in this new range by sustainable saree brand Suta, capture the beauty and ordinary wonders of the world through the gaze of 27-year-old Amrit Khurana, a young artist with autism from India.

The collection, released in April to mark Autism Awareness Month, is the first time that Suta founders Sujata and Taniya Biswas, have collaborated with an artist with a disability. 

The collaboration, says Amrit’s mother Aarti Khurana, happened quite by accident. “We were browsing on Instagram over a year ago and came across the brand Suta and found the name unusual (Suta means thread connecting the syllabus from the names of the founders - Su-Sujata and Ta-Taniya)”, says Aarti, who is a schoolteacher. “I got hooked to their posts and started showing them to Amrit”.

Many studies have established the strong links between autism and artistic ability. Children with autism have creative and cognitive abilities that far exceed their peers who are not on the spectrum. They are also better able to process details that other children.

In Amrit’s case too, this was evident from an early age. Formally diagnosed when she was 19 years old, this artist with autism has no formal training but she takes a keen interest in the day-to-day details and this show in her absorbing art that captures vividly the minute details. Amrit showed an interest in art when she was just three years old but the parallels between autism and artistic ability were initially overlooked as her parents were grappling with behavioural issues.

“We never paid any attention as we were struggling with her issues and the fact that she was non-verbal”, says Aarti. “She was eight years old when her artistic skills were recognised by her teacher at the Selaqui World School in Dehradun in north India and we realised that our daughter was speaking to us through her art”.

As her parents started paying closer attention, they were captivated and moved by the deeper connections and meanings Amrit was making. “Amrit had non-verbal autism but through her art would express even small outings and trips that we would make as a family across India. It could be the view of the mountains through a room in her window. Once we were travelling and stopped to take a break. There she saw some stray animals and drew them in her own unique way. Art masters later called it a unique piece”, says a proud Aarti.

Amrit’s journey as a person on the spectrum, the links between her autism and artistic ability have also been has been made into a documentary titled The reason I Jump. This was released at the Sundance Film Festival in January this year where it won the Audience Award.

Source: Amrit Khurana, young artist with autism from India, finds a new canvas in sarees, 2021

Aryan Debnath: App Designer

A 12-year-old schoolkid from Gurgaon has designed a smartphone app that helps autistic and different particular wants kids to assist them talk and perceive fundamental ideas corresponding to their day by day schedules. The little tech whiz, Aryan Debnath, is himself on the autistic spectrum, which has affected his capability to talk.


Regardless of his dysfunction, Aryan was at all times into science and expertise, says his mom Anamika. “Aryan was very inquisitive from a really early age. However in India, individuals aren’t very sensitized about autism so regardless of his urge to discover science and expertise, there was at all times a little bit of battle with us for his educating. However he continued,” she tells us. 


Ultimately, Aryan’s mom enrolled him in a web-based coding program by way of WhiteHat Jr. This allowed him to study the fundamentals of coding and likewise brush up on his analytical expertise. Placing the talents he learnt on-line to make use of, Aryan created an app known as Companion for autistic and different particular wants kids to assist them talk. Aryan’s dad and mom have been approached by US-based professor Dr. Stephen Shore, the Dean of New York’s, who desires the app to be uploaded to the App retailer and assist kids within the US.

Jiya Rai: Swimmer

Autism affected Jiya Rai holds the world record for the most special woman to swim in the open water at a speed of 14 km/hour 

She set a record by swimming in the Palk Strait between Rameswaram and Thalaimannar. At 5.25 pm, she reached the Arichalmunai beach in Rameswaram where she was welcomed by Tamil Nadu DGP C Sylendra Babu. He then presented her with a souvenir. In 2017, the DGP himself had swum in the Palk Strait. 

Source: Autism-affected girl creates history, swims from Sri Lanka to Dhanushkodi in 13 hours, 2022

Pranav Sridhar, Prem Shankar, and Saravana Raj: Web Developer

Students With Autism Designed A COVID Information Website For Visually Challenged

It is hard to believe, but true. Three Chennai students with autism Prem Shankar, Pranav Sridhar and Saravana Raj have designed India's first accessible website for COVID-19 data to help the visually challenged community access crucial COVID information. On their site https://hashhackcode.com/covid-19/ they simplify complex government data from state governments and the Indian Council of Medical Research (ICMR) often in the form of graphics, charts or pictures into accessible HTML form so that screen readers used by the visually impaired can read it. Normally, screen readers do not read data or information in such forms and visually challenge cannot access that.

21-year-old Pranav Sridhar an autistic student doing his visual communication has now turned into an accessible web developer. He loves the cause and works independently on his laptop. He says: "We live in an era where everything is online and digital. I want to help visually impaired people and neurodiverse individuals so that they can understand the real world as well as the digital world".

It was the brainchild of a techie social entrepreneur Manu Sekar who taught them web designing and coding at his academy initially and later remotely since the pandemic hit.

This is perhaps the first time a neurodiverse group has successfully developed a solution for another differently abled group. Explaining the need to skill neurodiverse groups including the autistic, Manu the Founder and CEO of HashHackCode says: "These people are shunned for most opportunities. They are always pushed towards low skilled jobs. This proves them all wrong that they are capable individuals and they solve real-world problems".

At Chennai's Valmiki Nagar, 25-year-old Prem Shankar, another autistic student updates Covid data on his laptop assisted by his mother Mangai Alwarappan. He meticulously copies from government websites. He has also designed celebration websites for weddings and has earned ₹ 7,000, so far. His mother had quit her job and learnt coding along with Prem so that she could guide him. She says

"Prem's sitting tolerance has improved. Earlier he couldn't sit beyond 10-20 minutes. Now he is able to work on his computer for an hour. He does not make any mistakes. His entry is so perfect. We are happy". His new IT (Information Technology) skills with the potential to earn have come as an inspiration to the family. His father Alwarappan added "Earlier we were worried. Now there is a little bit of ray of hope is there. He is earning now."

The experiment seen largely successful has roped in mothers as teammates, so over a period, each mother would be able to take wings and lead a group of individuals with autism besides helping her child scale new heights.

Deepa Satish, the mother of Saravana Raj the third member of the team had shifted base from Tuticorin to Chennai to help her son get skilled. She is quite happy.  She says "We have done it and we have proved that these children also can do websites and learn more and more of HTML and CSS coding."

The mothers are now raising awareness among IT companies, media digital platforms and corporates to earmark openings for skilled autistic persons. Roopa Sridhar, Pranav's mother says, "That is definitely the way looking forward for them. We are looking at a lot of options in the IT field".

The visually challenged welcome the accessible website the trio has developed.

In another part of Chennai, Selvamani a visually challenged IAS aspirant finds the site useful to update himself on COVID data every day at Nethrodaya, a centre for the visually challenged. He said, "It's like a one-stop-shop for COVID data. I am able to access information which I could not earlier".

C Govindakrishnan, Founder of Nethrodaya added "We are absolutely self-reliant, this website has given lots of impetus, edified our confidence to a different level.”

Source: Students With Autism In Chennai Built A Special COVID Website To Help Visually Challenged Stay Informed, 2021

“Autism is my superpower”

Pranav Bakshi: Model

Pranav Bakshi embraced autism as his superpower at an early age, and found his calling in modelling. The 19-year-old model who has proved autism cannot hold him back. Pranav Bakshi embraced autism as his superpower at an early age, and found his calling in modelling. He made headlines by becoming India’s first model with autism. Pranav has walked the ramp for a few well-known fashion labels.  

Source: Autism is my superpower: Pranav Bakshi, India's first model with autism, 2019

Siddharth with his parents, Jayasree and Muralee Thummarukudy

Siddharth Muralee: Painter

Siddharth Muralee — who suffers from Asperger Syndrome, an autism spectrum disorder — was always in awe of colours, shapes and numbers. And that led him to explore painting. “But there were times when he would not accept the different shades of a single colour,” recalls his mother Dr Jayasree.

She would then painstakingly explain to him the nuances of colour. That had an impact, and Siddharth has gone on to create varied art and hold a slew of exhibitions, including in Kochi, New Delhi, the UK and Canada. His joy knew no bounds when he became a part of the Kochi Biennale, at which he held a group exhibition with other painters. Siddharth, who baffles even his parents with his memory, designed a calendar in 2017 which carried his paintings drawn in different mediums.

All those experiences helped him gain confidence and pursue his studies with vigour. Having suffered the pain of various state government schools denying him an opportunity to study in normal schools, the 21-year-old has completed his BCom course with flying colours.

Dr Jayasree recounts it was not easy for her son to come to the forefront. Fortune smiled in the form of Choice School, Tripunithura, which took Siddharth on board along with an in-class assistant who helped him in his studies while at school, she says. But socializing remains an issue.

“Except for a Sri Lankan student, all these years, none of Siddharth’s friends have ever bothered to invite him for a birthday party or a casual visit to their homes,” she says, wishing people changed their attitudes to autistic children. “Siddharth helps me with household chores, and I have always taken that extra effort to ensure he has a normal life like any other child,” his mother says.

His father, Muralee Thummarukudy, the director of the Coordination Office of the G20 Global Initiative on environmental protection, believes Siddharth has come a long. But the Covid pandemic prevented the youngster from attending his second and third year BCom classes at the Sacred Heart College, Thevara. But that did not deter him from scoring several A grades. He now is keen on joining a chartered accountancy course.

Source: This autistic Kerala youth is in awe of colours and shapes

Tito Mukhopadhyay: Writer & Poet

Tito Mukhopadhyay (b. 1989) is a writer and poet. He was diagnosed with non-verbal autism in early childhood and was later invited to go to the UK for assessment by autism researcher Richard Mills. At about the same time the BBC broadcasted a documentary called "Tito's Story" and the National Autistic Society published his first book, "Beyond the Silence: My Life, the World and Autism" (2000), a collection of prose, poetry and philosophical texts. Tito later published many more books that can be found on Amazon. 

"One day I dream that we can grow in a matured society where nobody would be 'normal or abnormal' but just human beings, accepting any other human being - ready to grow together." - Tito Rajarshi Mukhopadhyay, in The Mind Tree: A Miraculous Child Breaks the Silence of Autism, National Autistic Society, 2003

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Soma Mukhopādhyāy is an Indian educator and the creator of the scientifically unproven Rapid Prompting Method, which is closely related to facilitated communication. Her use of the RPM with her autistic son Tito garnered media attention in America in the late 1990s and early 2000s.

Mukhopadhyay came to the United States in 2001, and joined Helping Autism through Learning and Outreach (HALO) in Texas in 2005. She also hosts workshops involving RPM worldwide. 

Achievers around the World

Iris - A Portrait of an Artist from Rupert Ward-Lewis on Vimeo


Like many autistic children, Iris's autism affects her in many ways, from sensory issues with noise and fabrics she comes into contact with, to problems with basic social and tactile interactions with the world around her.

Iris Grace Halmshaw: Painter

Iris Grace Halmshaw is a five year old (in 2013) who loves to paint. But unlike other children her age, Iris, who lives in Leicestershire, England, has art collectors around the world bidding on her work. Iris is autistic and struggles to express herself, but art has changed life for both the little girl and her family. It started in March 2013, when Iris tried painting as part of the homeschooling curriculum her mother created for her. Carter-Johnson quickly noticed that her little girl behaved very differently around paints.

"Once we had a setup with the paper taped onto her favorite table, she filled the paper with color. It wasn't random though, it was considered, and what I saw before me was beautiful," Carter-Johnson said. "Iris's mood had changed, too, She was elated, incredibly happy and free." Iris' gift has only become more extraordinary. Bids for some of the paintings being auctioned by the family exceed 4,000 British Pounds, or about $6,300.The family started sharing her story online, and they've been blown away by the response from around the world.

With the sales of her paintings, prints and other products we have been able to continue her private therapies every week and employ a private tutor to help me with her home education.


Her mom said she now communicates her feelings about that world directly through her paintbrush

Jacob Barnett: Physicist

Jacob Barnett, From Diagnosed Autistic To An IQ Higher Than Einstein

Born with Asperger’s syndrome, Jacob Barnett was written off by experts who insisted he would grow up locked in a world of his own. an ­astonishing grasp of maths and physics. He is even tipped for a Nobel prize. 

Jacob Barnett went on to achieve several milestones beating his severe autism to moderate.

At two, he understood the concept behind the spectrum of light. At eight years old, Jake has mastered high school Math. When 11 years old, Jake became a full-time student at Indiana University. At 11 years old, he was able to publish his study in a prestigious scientific journal. When 13, he spoke at the TEDxTeen Talk inspiring young people to change their approach to learning. At 15 years old, he took his Master’s at Waterloo’s Perimeter Institute for Theoretical Physics.

Studying at university 

Loc Tran on the Piano

Loc Tran: Musician

Loc Tran is a 17-year-old senior attending Champlin Park High School. While his gifts would be enough to make him a fan favorite in the autism community, he’s also blind. Not that it stops him from pursuing aspirations in music. Give this guy a song and he’ll give you five avenues composed in his brain. As you may have guessed, his math and numbers memory could rival that of Rain Man. He even composed a song for the Minnesota Timberwolves (perhaps he could write a few more given the team’s struggles). 

This continues the new trend in autism I noted last week with the New York Times article on the possible removal of Asperger Syndrome. A trend that shifts away from despair and the years of struggle for everyone involved to one that emphasizes individuality within the autism and other disability community. I can tell you that my capacity for music is nowhere near this guy, but we probably could share an intellectual moment in the sports world. Not a single sentence is mentioned about Tran’s difficulties as a result of his sight or autism. I’m sure they exist, but as I’ve come to learn through my documentaries and this blog, it’s hard to find someone that doesn’t have any crises to deal with.

Source: The “Wow” movement continues, TheSportsBrain, 2009

Peter Howson, Scottish Artist with Asperger's Syndrome

Peter Howson: Painter

Peter Howson was born in London of Scottish parents and moved with his family to Prestwick, Ayrshire His work has encompassed a number of themes. His early works are typified by very masculine working class men, most famously in The Heroic Dosser (1987). Later, in 1993, he was commissioned by the Imperial War Museum of London, to be the official war artist for the Bosnian War. he produced some of his most shocking and controversial work detailing the atrocities which were taking place at the time, like Plum Grove (1994). One painting in particular, Croatian and Muslim, detailing a rape created controversy partly because of its explicit subject matter but also because Howson had painted it from the victims' accounts. He was the official war painter at the Kosovo War for the London Times.

In more recent years his work has exhibited strong religious themes which some say is linked to the treatment of his alcoholism and drug addiction

His work has appeared in other media, with his widest exposure arguably for a British postage stamp he did in 1999 to celebrate engineering achievements for the millennium. In addition his work has been used on album covers by Live (Throwing Copper), The Beautiful South (Quench) and Jackie Leven (Fairytales for Hardmen). His work features in major collections including Ben Uri Gallery and Museum, Edinburgh City Art Centre, Glasgow Museums Resource Centre, Ferens Art Gallery, Guildhall Art Gallery, Harris Museum and Art Gallery, Herbert Art Gallery and Museum, High Life Highland Exhibitions Unit, Huntarian Art Gallery, Jerwood Collection, Middlesbrough Institute of Modern Art, National Galleries of Scotland, Nottingham City Museums and Galleries, Rozelle House Galleries, The Dick Institute, Fitzwilliam Museum, The Fleming Collection, Ingram Collection of Modern British Art and The Wilson.

Ping Lian Art Gallery @ The Settlement Hotel, at Malaysia’s Historic City, Melaka. 

Ping Lian Yeak: Painter 

Born in Malaysia on 18 Nov 1993 Ping Lian initially was hyperactive, living in his own world, not showing affection or awareness of danger, unable to hold a pencil to write or to use a scissor to cut.

In order to strengthen and develop Ping Lian’s fine motor skills, his home program focused on tracing and coloring activities. These activities also served as a way for Ping Lian to be able to occupy himself, given his inability to appropriately engage in any leisure or socialization skills. Now Ping Lian is a talented Artist full of love and affection.. Ping Lian still has limited communication and social skills. Art has provided him with an outlet of expression. His unique style of bold strokes and cheerful color has won over many art enthusiasts and collectors.

TV Coverage, exhibitions & books


Ping Lian continues to create magnificent works of art using charcoal, acrylic, water color, ink and oil. He also continues to donate his works to organisations and charities. His art works have been featured in exhibitions in the United States, UK, Australia, Germany, Japan, Korea, Singapore and Malaysia.

Satoshi Tajiri 

The success of Pokémon led to various manga adaptations, an anime, and more Pokémon games and spinoff games.

Satoshi Tajiri: Pokeman Creator

Satoshi Tajiri was born in Machida, a suburb of Tokyo. As a young boy, he loved to explore the outdoors he loved to collect insects, hunting for them in ponds, fields and forests . He had such an interest in collecting and studying insects that he earned the nickname "Dr. Bug" among his peers.At this time, Tajiri's passion for insects moved to video games and arcades.

Game Freak

Tajiri got into games when he was at technical school, spending all his time in arcades. He did not like school, and began skipping classes to spend more time at the arcades. Tajiri spent so much time playing games that one arcade gave him a full-sized Space Invaders machine to take home. Eventually, Tajiri graduated from a two-year program at the Tokyo National College of Technology.

In 1981, when he was sixteen years old, Tajiri won a contest sponsored by Nintendo rival Sega for a game design concept. A year later, in 1982, Tajiri and his friends formed a gaming magazine by the name of Game Freak. A friend and contributor to Game Freak was Ken Sugimori, who would later become the illustrator and designer of all of the Pokémon images, as well as the human characters and other aspects of the games.

He learned how to write software by first taking apart a Nintendo Entertainment System to see how it worked and then learning how to program for it.

In 1987, Tajiri published his first game, Quinty (Mendel Palace in North America). Two years later, he officially founded the company Game Freak, named after his magazine. Tajiri and Game Freak continued to develop many titles for companies such as Nintendo and Sega, such as 1991's Jerry Boy (which won Tajiri the Character Design Award from the Multimedia Content Association of Japan), and Yoshi, 1993's Mario & Wario, and 1994's Pulseman.

In 1990, Tajiri published a book entitled Catch The Packland — Stories of Videogames from Youth. It contains sixteen stories about Tajiri's memories of playing arcade games when he was in high school and college. 

Pokémon

In the early 1990s, when Tajiri first saw two children playing together with Game Boys using the Game Link Cable, he imagined insects crawling along the cable between the two systems. As he thought about the capabilities of the Game Link Cable, his idea for Pokémon grew, as he wanted to give modern children the chance to hunt for creatures as he did as a child.

After six years of development, Pokémon Red and Green Versions were completed. Although the Game Boy's hardware was becoming outdated, the game still grew steadily in popularity because younger children could not afford brand-new console games so they turned to the inexpensive Game Boy games.

https://youtu.be/g2EpmFzG2AM

Stephen Wiltshire draws New York Panorama

Sellout Exhibitions and City Panoramas


In 2001, he appeared in BBC documentary, Fragments of Genius, for which he was filmed flying over London aboard a helicopter and subsequently completing a detailed and perfectly scaled aerial illustration of a four-square-mile area within three hours; his drawing included 12 historic landmarks and 200 other structures.

In late 2003 the Orleans House Gallery in Twickenham, England, held the first major retrospective of Wiltshire's works, spanning a period of 20 years; more than 40,000 visitors attended the exhibit, shattering the gallery's attendance records.

Stephen took on his largest project to date in May 2005, when he returned to Tokyo to make a panoramic drawing - the largest of his career - of the city. He drew a similarly detailed picture of Rome, including the Vatican and St. Peter's Cathedral, entirely from memory.

Stephen Wiltshire: Painter

     

                            "Do the best you can and never stop"


Stephen Wiltshire is an artist who draws detailed cityscapes. He has a particular talent for drawing lifelike, accurate impressions of cities, skylines and street scenes after having only observed them briefly. 

Career :Stephen started drawing at the age of five and sold his first work to the Prime Minister of the United Kingdom at the age of eight. President of London's Royal Academy of Art, referred to him as the best child artist in Britain. The media interest soon turned nationwide and the seven year old Stephen Wiltshire made his first steps to launch his lifelong career. The same year he sold his first work and by the time he turned 8, he received his first commission from the British Prime Minister to create a drawing of Salisbury Cathedral. In February 1987 Stephen appeared in The Foolish Wise Ones. 

Stephen's first trip abroad, to New York City, where he sketched such legendary skyscrapers as the Empire State Building and the Chrysler Building, as part of a feature being prepared by the London-based International Television News. Meanwhile in New York Stephen met Oliver Sacks.

The resulting illustrations from his visit - along with sketches of sites in the London Docklands, Paris, and Edinburgh - formed the basis for his second book, Cities (1989), which also included some drawings of purely imaginary metropolises. Stephen embarked on a drawing tour of Venice, Amsterdam, Leningrad, and Moscow, attracting crowds wherever he stopped to draw. He was accompanied part of the time by Sacks, who was conducting research for a new book on Stephen's story .His third book, Floating Cities (1991), contains the elaborate drawings he made on the tour. In 1992 Stephen accepted the invitation of a Tokyo-based television company to tour Japan and make drawings of various landmark structures, including the Tokyo metropolitan government building, in Shinjuku, and the Ginza shopping district. He then traveled to America once again, a trip that resulted in the book American Dream (1993), which featured cityscapes of Chicago, San Francisco, and New York, as well as the desert landscape of Arizona.

Stephen's artwork was being exhibited frequently in venues all over the world. 

Stephen spent a week creating a 10-meter-long drawing of Hong Kong's Victoria Harbour and the surrounding urban scene. Later on he added Frankfurt, Madrid, Dubai, Jerusalem and London to his collection.

New York where he embarked a five day marathon drawing on a 6 metres canvas live on CBS.Further trips followed to Sydney, Shanghai, Brisbane, Singapore, Istanbul, Houston, Mexico City and Doha, Qatar later.

Temple Grandin: Animal Scientist & Professor, Activist for Autism Rights

Dr. Grandin did not talk until she was three and a half years old.  She was fortunate to get early speech therapy.  Her teachers also taught her how to wait and take turns when playing board games.  She was mainstreamed into a normal kindergarten at age five. Oliver Sacks wrote in the forward of Thinking in Pictures that her first book Emergence: Labeled Autistic was “unprecedented because there had never before been an inside narrative of autism.”  Dr. Sacks profiled Dr. Grandin in his best selling book Anthropologist on Mars.

Dr. Grandin became a prominent author and speaker on both autism and animal behavior. Today she is a professor of Animal Science at Colorado State University.  She also has a successful career consulting on both livestock handling equipment design and animal welfare.  She has been featured on NPR (National Public Radio) and a BBC Special – The Woman Who Thinks Like a Cow. 

When she was young, she was considered weird and teased and bullied in high school.  The only place she had friends was activities where there was a shared interest such as horses, electronics, or model rockets. Mr. Carlock, her science teacher, was an important mentor who encouraged her interest in science.  When she had a new goal of becoming a scientist, she had a reason for studying. Today half the cattle in the United States are handled in facilities she has designed.

Autistics who have changed the World


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