Coming up with a name for your cat can be a lengthy process. Common or stereotypical names like “Fluffy” or “Garfield” may not cut it for some cat owners, and the vague nickname “Cat,” made famous in the film “Breakfast at Tiffany’s,” forces others to think that you did not put much effort in naming your feline. Since cats are more mysterious and guarded with their emotions, they’re often more challenging to name than other pets like dogs.
For clues on the ideal name, watch your cat’s day-to-day activities. Does your pet tear around your home like a Tasmanian Devil, or does it spend most of its time staring out the window? What does your pet do that makes you laugh or scream? Whether they’re lazy or full of energy, we all know that felines are intelligent. What better way to show off your smart kitty to the world than to give it a scientific name? To make your name search easier, we’ve developed a lengthy list of unique names relating to the world of science and its most famous contributors.
Female Cat Names Based on Famous Scientists
History has not been fair to female scientists by overlooking their accomplishments in favor of highlighting famous men in the field. What better way to honor those incredible thinkers than naming your female cat after one of them? Is your cat an animal lover like Jane Goodall, or does she enjoy the natural beauty of the outdoors like the American botanist Elizabeth Briton? Read on to get some inspiration!
Adamson (Joy)
Agnesi (Maria)
Agnodice
Anderson (Elizabeth Garret)
Anning (Mary)
Apgar (Virginia)
Arden (Elizabeth)
Bailey (Florence Augusta Merriam)
Barre-Sinoussi (Francoise)
Barton (Clara)
Bascom (Florence)
Bassi (Laura Maria)
Bath (Patricia Era)
Benedict (Ruth)
Benerito (Ruth)
Blackwell (Elizabeth)
Britton (Elizabeth)
Brooks (Harriet)
Cannon (Annie Jump)
Carson (Rachel)
Châtelet (Émilie du)
Cleopatra the Alchemist
Comnena (Anna)
Cori (Gerty T.)
Crane (Eva)
Easley (Annie)
Elion (Gertrude Bell)
Curie (Marie)
Evans (Alice)
Fossey (Dian)
Franklin (Rosalind)
Germain (Sophie)
Gilbreth (Lillian)
Giliani (Alessandra)
Mayer (Maria Goeppert)
Goldring (Winifred)
Goodall (Jane)
Grant (B. Rosemary)
Hamilton (Alice)
Harrison (Ann Jane)
Herschel (Caroline)
Hildegard of Bingen
Hopper (Grace)
Hrdy (Sarah Blaffer)
Hypatia of Alexandria
Jonas (Doris F.)
King (Mary-Claire)
King (Nicole)
Kovalevskaya (Sofia)
Leakey (Mary)
Lederberg (Esther)
Lehmann (Inge)
Levi-Montalcini (Rita)
Lovelace (Ada)
Maathai (Wangari)
Margulis (Lynn)
Maria the Jewess
McClintock (Barbara)
Mead (Margaret)
Meitner (Lise)
Merian (Maria Sibylla)
Mitchell (Maria)
Moran (Nancy A.)
Moser (May-Britt)
Nightingale (Florence)
Noether (Emmy)
Novello (Antonia)
Payne-Gaposchkin (Cecilia)
Piscopia (Elena Conaro)
Profet (Margaret)
Ray (Dixy Lee)
Richards (Ellen Swallow)
Ride (Sally)
Sabin (Florence)
Sanger (Margaret)
Scott (Charlotte Angas)
Shattuck (Lydia White)
Somerville (Mary)
Stevenson (Sarah Ann Hackett)
Stott (Alicia)
Taussig (Helen)
Tilghman (Shirley)
Tobias (Shelia)
Trota of Salerno
Villa-Komaroff (Lydia)
Vrba (Elisabeth S.)
Workman (Fanny Bullock)
Wu (Chien-Shiung)
Xilingshi
Yalow (Rosalyn)
Image Credit: Andy Gin, Shutterstock
Male Cat Names Based on Famous Scientists
Although we’ve categorized the scientists into female and male groups, you’re welcome to give your cat a name from either list. Last names sound more neutral than first names, and they’re suitable for Tomcats and female furballs. Here is a list of our top choices for scientist-inspired names for your male cat.
Alvarez (Luis)
Ampère (André-Marie)
Anaximander
Archimedes
Aristarchus
Aristotle
Amedeo Avogadro
Bacon (Francis)
Bell (Alexander Graham)
Bernoulli (Daniel)
Bohr (Niels)
Boyle (Robert)
Brahe (Tycho)
Brahmagupta
Bunsen (Robert)
Cajal (Santiago Ramón y)
Carver (George Washington)
Chadwick (James)
Chandrasekhar (Subrahmanyan)
Chargaff (Erwin)
Copernicus (Nicolaus)
Cousteau (Jacques)
Dalton (John)
Darwin (Charles)
Democritus
Descartes (René)
Drake (Frank)
Einstein (Albert)
Eratosthenes
Euclid
Euler (Leonhard)
Faraday (Michael)
Fermat (Pierre de)
Fibonacci
Fisher (Ronald)
Fleming (Alexander)
Franklin (Benjamin)
Galen
Galilei (Galileo)
Gauss (Carl Friedrich)
Gibbs (Willard)
Harvey (William)
Hertz (Heinrich)
Hilbert (David)
Hipparchus
Hippocrates
Hooke (Robert)
Horner (Jack)
Hubble (Erwin)
Hutton (James)
Kepler (Johannes)
Khayyam (Omar)
Landsteiner (Karl)
Lavoisier (Antoine)
Leeuwenhoek (Antonie van)
Linnaeus (Carolus)
Maxwell (James Clerk)
Mendel (Gregor)
Moseley (Henry)
Newton (Isaac)
Nobel (Alfred)
Oersted (Hans Christian)
Pasteur (Louis)
Pauling (Linus)
Planck (Max)
Pythagoras
Ptolemy (Claudius)
Raman (C. V.)
Ramanujan (Srinivasa)
Redi (Francesco Redi)
Rutherford (Ernest)
Sagan (Carl)
Schwann (Theodor)
Shoemaker (Gene)
Skinner (B. F.)
Thales of Miletus
Thomson (J. J.)
Vesalius (Andreas)
Virchow (Rudolf)
Volta (Alessandro)
Wallace (Alfred R.)
Watt (James)
Wegener (Alfred)
Yang (Chen-Ning)
Image Credit: Marvin Otto, Pixabay
Unisex Cat Names Based on Computer Terminology
The list of tech terms seems to grow every day, and we only included a small portion of terms relating to computers and technology. Several words and phrases related to the tech world are incompatible with felines. For instance, you probably do not want a cat named Metadata, KBps, flash drive, UAT, or Web application framework. Here are some unique unisex names based on computer terminology we think will suit your cat well!
Adder
Address
AJAX
Alias
Alpha
ALU
Android
Apache
Apple
Babbage
Beta
Binary
Bit
Boolean
Bot
Chip
Circuit
Cisco
CLI
Cluster
Code
Digit
Glitch
Linux
Python
RAM
Image Credit: Chansom Pantip, Shutterstock
Final Thoughts
Scientists and felines have a lot in common. Like pioneering scientists, cats are bold animals whose curiosity often dictates their actions. They rarely follow the rules and usually expect the world to revolve around them. They’re often misunderstood by the public, and their personalities tend to get them in trouble. We hope our lists have helped you pick a fitting scientific name for your little Copernicus.
Nicole is the proud mom of 3 rescue fur babies, Baby, a Burmese cat; Rosa, a New Zealand Huntaway; and Mac, a Lab/Mastiff. A Canadian expat, Nicole now lives on a lush forest property with her Kiwi husband and new baby daughter in New Zealand. She has a strong love for all animals of all shapes and sizes (and particularly loves a good interspecies friendship) and wants to share her animal knowledge and other experts' knowledge with pet lovers across the globe....Read more
