Margaret Burbidge facts for kids
Quick facts for kids
Margaret Burbidge
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Burbidge pictured in 1976
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| Born |
Eleanor Margaret Peachey
12 August 1919 |
| Died | 5 April 2020 (aged 100) San Francisco, California
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| Nationality | British |
| Citizenship | American (from 1977) |
| Known for | B2FH paper |
| Spouse(s) | Geoffrey Burbidge |
| Awards | Fellow of the Royal Society (1964) Henry Norris Russell Lectureship (1984) Gold Medal of the Royal Astronomical Society (2005) and others |
| Scientific career | |
| Fields | Stellar nucleosynthesis, quasars, galaxy rotation curves |
Eleanor Margaret Burbidge (born Peachey; 12 August 1919 – 5 April 2020) was a famous British-American observational astronomer and astrophysicist. She made huge contributions to our understanding of the universe.
In the 1950s, Margaret Burbidge was one of the scientists who helped create the idea of stellar nucleosynthesis. This is the theory that explains how stars create all the different chemical elements. She was the main author of a very important scientific paper called the B2FH paper.
Later, in the 1960s and 1970s, she studied how galaxies spin, known as rotation curves. She also researched mysterious, super bright objects called quasars. She even discovered the most distant object known in the universe at that time!
Margaret Burbidge also worked on the Hubble Space Telescope. She helped develop a special camera for it called the Faint Object Spectrograph. She was also well-known for fighting against unfair treatment of women in science.
She held many important leadership jobs. These included being the Director of the Royal Greenwich Observatory and President of the American Astronomical Society. She worked at several top universities and observatories throughout her long career.
Contents
Becoming an Astronomer
Margaret Burbidge studied at University College London (UCL). She earned her first degree in 1939 and her Ph.D. in 1943. During World War II, she worked at the UCL Observatory. The wartime blackout actually helped her use the telescopes better, as there was less light pollution.
In 1945, she tried to get a special research job at Carnegie Observatories. But she was turned down because the job required observing at Mount Wilson Observatory, which only allowed men at the time. This was one of her first experiences with unfair treatment in science.
After the war, she taught astronomy to students at the University of London. One of her students was the famous science fiction writer Arthur C. Clarke.
Discovering How Stars Make Elements
In 1951, Margaret Burbidge moved to the United States. She started working at the University of Chicago's Yerkes Observatory. Here, she focused on studying the amounts of different chemical elements found in stars.
She returned to the UK in 1953. There, she and her husband, Geoffrey Burbidge, joined a team with William Alfred Fowler and Fred Hoyle at the University of Cambridge. This team made a huge breakthrough in astronomy.
They combined Margaret and Geoffrey's observations of elements in stars with Hoyle's idea that stars could create all elements through nuclear reactions. Fowler also did lab experiments to test these reactions. This amazing idea became known as stellar nucleosynthesis.
Their team published their findings in a series of papers. The most important one came out in 1957. It's now famous as the B2FH paper, named after the first letters of their last names: Burbidge, Burbidge, Fowler, and Hoyle. Margaret Burbidge was the main writer of this paper.
The B2FH paper showed that most heavier chemical elements are formed inside stars as they evolve. This theory is still the basic idea for how stars create elements today. Later, William Fowler won the Nobel Prize in Physics for his work on nucleosynthesis. He was surprised that Margaret Burbidge was not included.
Working in California
When William Fowler moved back to the U.S., he suggested the Burbidges come too. Margaret tried again to get a research job at Mount Wilson Observatory, but she was still refused because she was a woman.
So, Margaret and Geoffrey swapped applications. Geoffrey got the job at Mount Wilson, and Margaret took a position at Caltech in 1955. When Geoffrey had to observe at Mount Wilson, Margaret would go with him. She pretended to be his assistant, but she was actually the one operating the telescope!
When the observatory managers found out, they finally agreed she could use the telescope. But only if she and her husband stayed in a separate cottage, not the main dorm, which was only for men.
In 1962, she joined the University of California, San Diego (UCSD). In the 1960s and 1970s, she studied the size, makeup, and spin of galaxies. She also did early studies of quasars using special light analysis.
One of her big discoveries was a quasar called QSO B1442+101. It was the most distant object known in the universe at the time, a record she held for eight years! While she supported the steady state theory of the universe, her work on quasars actually helped support the Big Bang theory.
Fighting for Fairness
In 1972, Margaret Burbidge became the director of the Royal Greenwich Observatory (RGO) in the UK. For 300 years, this job had always been held by the "Astronomer Royal." But when Margaret was appointed, the two jobs were separated. She sometimes thought this was due to sexism. She left the RGO after only 15 months because of a disagreement about moving a large telescope.
Margaret Burbidge strongly spoke out against discrimination against women in astronomy. She also didn't agree with "positive discrimination," which means giving special treatment to women. In 1972, she turned down the Annie J. Cannon Award in Astronomy because it was only given to women. She said, "It is high time that discrimination in favor of, as well as against, women in professional life be removed."
Her decision led the American Astronomical Society (AAS) to create its first committee on the status of women in astronomy. In 1976, she became the first female president of the AAS. During her time as president, she convinced the members to stop holding meetings in states that had not approved the Equal Rights Amendment to the U.S. Constitution. In 1984, the AAS gave her its highest honor, the Henry Norris Russell Lectureship, which is open to everyone, regardless of gender.
From 1979 to 1988, she was the first director of UCSD's Center for Astrophysics and Space Science. In 1981, she was elected President of the American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS).
At UCSD, she helped create the Faint Object Spectrograph for the Hubble Space Telescope, which launched in 1990. Using this instrument, she and her team found that the galaxy Messier 82 has a supermassive black hole at its center. She continued her research until the early 21st century and wrote over 370 scientific papers.
Her Life
Eleanor Margaret Peachey was born in Davenport, Stockport, UK, on August 12, 1919. This was nine months after World War I ended. Her parents were Marjorie Stott Peachey and Stanley John Peachey.
She first became interested in astronomy when she was only 3 or 4 years old. This happened after she saw the stars during a ferry trip across the English Channel. By age 12, she was already reading astronomy books by James Jeans, who was a distant relative of her mother.
On April 2, 1948, Margaret Peachey married Geoffrey Burbidge. They had met six months earlier at University College London. Geoffrey was a theoretical physicist, but Margaret's love for astronomy convinced him to switch to theoretical astrophysics. They worked together on much of their research.
The couple had a daughter named Sarah, who was born in late 1956. In 1977, Margaret became a citizen of the United States. Geoffrey Burbidge passed away in 2010. Margaret Burbidge died on April 5, 2020, in San Francisco. She was 100 years old and passed away after a fall.
Honors and Awards
Margaret Burbidge received many awards and honors for her amazing work in astronomy:
Awards
- Helen B. Warner Prize for Astronomy, 1959 (with Geoffrey Burbidge, for the B2FH paper)
- Fellow of the Royal Society, 1964
- Fellow of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences (1969)
- President, American Astronomical Society (1976-1978)
- Karl G. Jansky Lectureship, National Radio Astronomy Observatory (1977)
- Member of the National Academy of Sciences (1978)
- Member of the American Philosophical Society (1980)
- Catherine Wolfe Bruce medal of the Astronomical Society of the Pacific (1982)
- National Medal of Science (1983)
- President, American Association for the Advancement of Science (1983)
- Henry Norris Russell Lectureship (1984)
- Association pour le Développement International de l'Observatoire de Nice (ADION) medal (1987)
- Albert Einstein World Award of Science (1988)
- Inducted into the Women's Museum of California Hall of Fame (2003)
- Gold Medal of the Royal Astronomical Society, with Geoffrey Burbidge (2005)
- Inaugural Fellow of the American Astronomical Society (2020)
Named after her
- Asteroid 5490 Burbidge
- Margaret Burbidge Award of the American Physical Society
See also
In Spanish: Margaret Burbidge para niños
