Berta Karlik (January 24, 1904 – February 4, 1990) was an Austrian physicist. She worked for the University of Vienna, eventually becoming the first female professor at the institution. While working with Ernst Foyn she published a paper on the radioactivity of seawater. She discovered that the chemical element 85 astatine is a product of the natural decay processes. The element was first synthesized in 1940 by Dale R. Corson, , and Emilio Segrè, after several scientists in vain searched for it in radioactive minerals.