Incoming Chief Judge Kimberly Moore, left, and outgoing Chief Judge Sharon Prost, right. (Courtesy photos.)

For more than a decade of its 39 years in existence, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit has been led by a female chief judge.

On Monday the court's second woman to hold the position, Sharon Prost, informally passed the gavel to the third, Kimberly Moore, during the Federal Circuit's annual Bench-Bar Conference.