Vera Cooper Rubin, the groundbreaking astronomer who transformed our understanding of the fundamental structure underlying the universe, was a true visionary of the 20th century. She was also a pragmatic problem-solver, further equipped with a sense of humor. Around 1970, making a return visit to conduct observations at the Palomar Observatory in southern California, Rubin decided to take action on the notorious “absence of facilities” for female astronomers. Women researchers were rarely admitted to pursue research at the legendary site. She deftly cut out a paper skirt and taped it to the male silhouette on the bathroom door: obstacle overcome.
Fellow astronomers Jacqueline and Simon Mitton have produced an absorbing biography,
Vera Rubin: A Life (available February 11 from Harvard University Press), meshing the two strands of Rubin’s remarkable accomplishments into a page-turning account of an existence in full. First, the co-authors document a mind at work, creating an accessible and riveting record of Rubin’s insights. Ultimately, she would present data that revolutionized our understanding of the cosmos. Rubin’s research on the rotation of spiral galaxies—which she showed were enmeshed in the gravitational nexus of vast clouds of dark matter—contributed significantly to confirming, beyond doubt, the existence of dark matter, that mysterious, invisible force in the universe.
Second, the Mittons record the emergence of Rubin, born in 1928, who faced daunting obstacles as a pioneering woman entering a scientific career during the 1950s, as an unrelenting advocate for women in science. Until her death in 2016, she played a pivotal role as mentor to the next generation of researchers, particularly astronomers. (Her four children would earn PhDs; her daughter Judy became an astronomer as well.) The children recalled the family dining table, heaped with papers and books, as a central location in the world of ideas: Rubins of every age, whether doing homework or transforming our understanding of modern physics and astronomy, understood that deep thinking was fun.
“Don’t let anyone keep you down for silly reasons such as who you are,” Rubin once counseled a young astrophysicist, Rebecca Oppenheimer. “The real prize is finding something new out there.”
—Kathleen Burke, senior editor
