International Women's Day 2024: Women in physics
March 8 is International Women's Day and today we want to highlight women in physics. There are many examples including Marie Curie, Maria Goeppert Mayer and Lise Meitner to Fabiola Gianotti and Lene Hau. We also mention some of the female professors of physics who belong to the Fysikum.
Marie Curie - November 1867 to July 1934
Marie Curie is the first woman to be awarded a Nobel Prize and the only woman to be awarded it twice. The first was in physics in 1903 for research into radioactivity and the second in chemistry in 1911, when she discovered and named two completely new radioactive elements, radium and polonium.
Maria Goeppert Mayer - June 1906 to February 1972
The second woman to win the Nobel Prize is Maria Mayer for her discovery of the shell structure of atomic nuclei. She is also remembered for two-photon absorption of atoms - a theory that was difficult to prove at the time of publication, but with the advent of lasers was easily substantiated. The unit of two-photon absorption cross sections called Goeppert-Mayer units (GM units) after Maria.
Lise Meitner - November 1878 to October 1968
She is as famous for helping to discover nuclear fission as for being deprived of the Nobel Prize by the Nobel Committee. Lise Meitner has gone down in physics history by launching the revolutionary hypothesis that nuclear fission occurs when uranium is exposed to neutron radiation in December 1938, interpreting an experiment conducted by Otto Hahn. The hypothesis was confirmed in January 1939 by an experiment conducted by the Swedish physicist's nephew Otto Robert Frisch.
Today's women in physics
Jocelyn Bell Burnell. Astrophysicist; The first person to observe pulsars
Sandra Faber; Astrophysicist; Pioneering studies in galaxy evolution
Joan Feynman; Astrophysicist; The study of solar wind particles and fields; also discovers the origin of auroras
Fabiola Gianotti; Particle physicist; Director General of CERN
Lene Hau; Quantum physicist; Slowing down and finally stopping a beam of light
Female professors at Fysikum
Katherine Freese, Professor of Astroparticle Physics, Division of Cosmology, Astroparticle Physics and String Theory.
Kerstin Jon-And, Professor Emerita in Physics, Division of Astroparticle Physics and Elementary Particle Physics.
Åsa Larson, Professor of Theoretical Molecular Physics, Division of Atomic Physics
Eva Lindroth, Professor of Theoretical Atomic Physics, Division of Atomic Physics
Hiranya Peiris, Professor of Astrophysics, Division of Cosmology, Astroparticle Physics and String Theory.
Sara Strandberg, Professor of Particle Physics, Division of Astroparticle Physics and Elementary Particle Physics
This is a selection of those who are with us and we also have a number of other female physicists at Fysikum.
More Information
Apply for our physics courses and programmes! Application period 15/3 - 15/4
Last updated: March 8, 2024
Source: Gunilla Häggström, Communications Officer, Fysikum