"Thank you for your courage to pursue knowledge and truth in times and places that tried to deny you that right. Thank you for persisting when your work was dismissed, stolen, or erased. Thank you for the discoveries that changed our world - from understanding the building blocks of life, to measuring the cosmos, to healing disease, to unlocking the power of computation.

But more than your scientific achievements, thank you for proving that brilliance has no gender, no prescribed background, no single face. Every time you faced a locked door and found a way through - or broke it down - you opened pathways for countless others. Your legacy isn't just in the structures of DNA or insulin, the treatment for leprosy, or the measurements of stars. It's in every person who now pursues science because you showed it was possible.

I'm sorry that so many of you didn't receive the recognition you deserved in your lifetimes. I'm sorry for every credit stolen, every contribution overlooked, every door slammed shut. But I want you to know: we remember you now. We're still learning from you. And we're trying to build a world where the next generation of brilliant minds won't have to fight so hard just to be heard."