Along with searching for your specific scientist by name in UC Library Search and the encyclopedias/reference works, here are some biographical sources.
Provides information on the history of science through articles on the professional lives of scientists. All periods of science from classical antiquity to modern times are represented.
From Archimedes and Copernicus to Stephen Hawking and Stephen Jay Gould, this authoritative biographical dictionary spans over 2,500 years and covers all fields of science, from astronomy to mathematics to ecology to medicine. Abridged ed 1999.
Profiles of 120+ women: astronomers, mathematicians, physicists, crystallographers, chemists, biochemists, biologists, medical professionals, inventors and technologists, and ecologists.
About 15,000 biographical citations about some 7700 scientists, most of whom were well known among their contemporaries but are "now seen in perspective, of second-order importance." Sources were English-language, general scientific journals (7 titles).
