Photo: Sintegrity, CC BY-SA 4.0 — Source
Northern Irish astrophysicist who, as a postgraduate student in 1967, discovered pulsars — rapidly rotating neutron stars emitting regular radio pulses. The discovery was one of the most significant in 20th-century astronomy, but the 1974 Nobel Prize in Physics went to her supervisor Antony Hewish and Martin Ryle instead. Rather than expressing bitterness, she has spoken thoughtfully about the systemic biases in scientific recognition. She was awarded the Special Breakthrough Prize in Fundamental Physics in 2018, donating the entire £2.3 million to fund underrepresented students in physics.
Source: Royal Society