Like a lot of early inventors, Benjamin Banneker was primarily self-taught. The son of former slaves, Benjamin received some early education from a Quaker school. But most of his advanced knowledge came from just reading. At 15 he took over the farm and invented an irrigation system to control water flow to the crops from nearby springs. As a result, the farm flourished – even during droughts. He also created a fully functioning clock entirely out of carved wooden pieces.

Agricultural chemist, George Washington Carver invented three hundred uses for peanuts and hundreds more uses for soybeans, pecans, and sweet potatoes. More than anyone else in history.

Even in high school, John Henry Thompson was interested in computer programming languages. He taught himself several programming languages such as FORTRAN, PLI, COBOL and JCL while working in a New York research facility. He developed a number of products, many of them based on his most famous invention, Lingo programming: a scripting language that helps render visuals in computer programs

In 1989, emulating the bees' honeycomb construction, Emeagwali used 65,000 processors to invent the world's fastest computer, which performs computations at 3.1 billion calculations per second.

Otis Boykin is best known for inventing an improved electrical resistor used in computers, radios, television sets and a variety of electronic devices. His resistor helped reduce the cost of those products. Otis Boykin also invented a variable resistor used in guided missile parts, a control unit for heart stimulators, a burglar-proof cash register and a chemical air filter. In total, Otis Boykin patented twenty-eight electronic devices.

Not many inventors have resumes as impressive as George Edward Alcorn's. the African-American inventor received a B.A. in physics, a master's degree in nuclear physics and a Ph.D in atomic and molecular physics. On top of that, Alcorn worked for the likes of Philco-Ford, Perkin-Elmer, IBM and NASA, created over 20 different inventions and was granted eight patents.

The first video home security system was patented to Marie Brown. The system had a set of four peep holes and a camera that could slide up and down to look out each one. Anything the camera picked up would appear on a monitor. An additional feature of Brown's invention was that a person also could unlock a door with a remote control.

Recipient of the L’Oreal-UNESCO Women in Science Award for Africa and the Arab states is Tebello Nyokong. She is a professor of medicinal chemistry and nanotechnology at South Africa’s Rhodes University and has focused on natural chemicals that “can be used as photosensitive drugs for cancer treatment.”

If you own or use a cell phone, digital camera or recorder, James E. West played a key role in its development. West is co-winner of the 2010 Benjamin Franklin Medal in electrical engineering from the Franklin Institute. The electrical and computer engineering professor at Johns Hopkins University invented the first practical electret microphone. The device is found in billions of portable devices worldwide.