British astrophysicist, Dame Jocelyn Bell Burnell, has generously donated a £2.3 million prize to promote diversity within STEM fields. Burnell’s noteworthy career in science includes a pivotal role in the discovery of pulsars.
Dame Bell Burnell was awarded the Breakthrough Prize for her significant contributions to science, particularly her involvement in the discovery of pulsars. Despite her crucial role, she was a PhD student at the time and was consequently overlooked for the 1974 Nobel Prize, which was awarded to her senior male colleagues.
She has since decided to donate the monetary award to the Institute of Physics in a bid to enhance research opportunities for women and ethnic minority groups within the field. ‘I think diversity is very important, and I hope this might increase the diversity a bit,’ she remarked. ‘One of the under-represented groups in physics is women, so that is one that interests me. But groups with various ethnicities could well be included; it would be wonderful if we could find a refugee or two.’
Pulsars, the celestial objects discovered thanks to Burnell’s work, are rotating neutron stars that emit pulses of electromagnetic radiation. Dame Bell Burnell, originally from Northern Ireland, highlighted the challenges she faced as a pioneering woman in a predominantly male-dominated field. ‘They don’t often give the Nobel Prize to students… it’s perceived as a senior man’s prize. In the late 60s, early 70s, when all this was happening, science was very male-dominated and, in Britain, white male-dominated. I came in as a female and came into Cambridge from the north and west of the UK – I had never been that far south before. I was really scared, I thought they had made a mistake admitting me, reckoned they were going to throw me out in due course but decided to work my very hardest so that when they threw me out I wouldn’t have a guilty conscience and I was being incredibly thorough.’
Dame Jocelyn Bell Burnell’s selfless donation aims to create more inclusive opportunities within the scientific community, ultimately aspiring to foster a diverse and equitable environment in STEM.