Margaret Burbidge. Against all Odds

Abstract

In 1945, Margaret Burbidge was denied a fellowship to work at the Mt. Wilson Observatory, reserved for men only. In 1955, she finally gained access by posing as her husband's assistant but was forced to live apart from him to maintain the charade. In 1957, she was part of the team known as B2FH: Burbidge, Burbidge, Fowler, and Hoyle. She and her husband Geoffrey, along with William Fowler and Fred Hoyle, derived the mechanism by which stars produce the elements. In 1972, she was awarded the directorship of the Royal Greenwich Observatory but uniquely denied the concomitant title of Astronomer Royal. Burbidge also carried out studies of quasars, participated in the design of a spectrometer for the Hubble telescope, and was part of the team that identified a massive black hole in a galaxy. She has an asteroid named after her. She was active in research until her death in 2020 at age 100. She was a leader in the fight to end gender discrimination against women in astronomy.