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    Vera Rubin Paper

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    Rosey Mulvey
    Vera Rubin was a pioneering female astronomer born in 1928 in Philadelphia. She discovered that galaxies spin too fast to stay intact unless embedded in dark matter, which makes up 85% of the universe. She confirmed the existence of dark matter and its role in holding galaxies together. Rubin faced significant challenges as a woman in astronomy, as she was denied admission to programs and observatories due to her gender. She advocated publicly for women's inclusion in science.

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    Vera Rubin Paper

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    Rosey Mulvey
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    Vera Rubin was a pioneering female astronomer born in 1928 in Philadelphia. She discovered that galaxies spin too fast to stay intact unless embedded in dark matter, which makes up 85% of the universe. She confirmed the existence of dark matter and its role in holding galaxies together. Rubin faced significant challenges as a woman in astronomy, as she was denied admission to programs and observatories due to her gender. She advocated publicly for women's inclusion in science.

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    Vera Rubin was a pioneering female astronomer born in 1928 in Philadelphia. She discovered that galaxies spin too fast to stay intact unless embedded in dark matter, which makes up 85% of the universe. She confirmed the existence of dark matter and its role in holding galaxies together. Rubin faced significant challenges as a woman in astronomy, as she was denied admission to programs and observatories due to her gender. She advocated publicly for women's inclusion in science.

    Copyright:

    © All Rights Reserved
    Download as DOCX, PDF, TXT or read online from Scribd
    Download as docx, pdf, or txt
    173 views3 pages

    Vera Rubin Paper

    Uploaded by

    Rosey Mulvey
    Vera Rubin was a pioneering female astronomer born in 1928 in Philadelphia. She discovered that galaxies spin too fast to stay intact unless embedded in dark matter, which makes up 85% of the universe. She confirmed the existence of dark matter and its role in holding galaxies together. Rubin faced significant challenges as a woman in astronomy, as she was denied admission to programs and observatories due to her gender. She advocated publicly for women's inclusion in science.

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    © All Rights Reserved
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    Vera Rubin was a pioneering female astronomer whose work confirmed the existence of dark matter and demonstrated that galaxies are embedded in dark-matter halos. She was motivated by her passion for astronomy from a young age.

    Vera Rubin's important work involved measuring how fast galaxies spin from their centers to their fringes. She found that galaxies spin so fast that they should fall apart, but are kept intact by dark matter, which makes up at least 85% of the universe.

    Vera Rubin faced challenges as a female scientist - she was not admitted to Princeton's astronomy program because she was a woman, and was the first woman allowed to observe at Caltech's Palomar Observatory. She advocated for women to be admitted to scientific organizations and institutions.

    Vera Rubin

    Vera Cooper Rubin was born in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania on July 23,


    1928. She was the younger of the two daughters of Philip Cooper, an
    electrical engineer, and Rose Cooper nee Applebaum (Larsen 2019). She
    passed away at age 88 on Christmas Day 2016 (Domonoske 2016). Vera
    Rubin was a pioneer for female scientists and a groundbreaking astronomer
    whose findings confirmed the existence of dark matter and demonstrated
    that galaxies are embedded in dark-matter halos, (Bahcall 2017).
    In an interview with Vera Rubin in 1990, Marcia Bartusiak recounted
    the story of how after Rubin and her family moved to Washington D.C. when
    she was ten, she would stay awake at night looking out of her window at the
    moving constellations and meteors. Her passion for astronomy was strong
    her entire life and would motivate her to be the seminal astronomer she
    became (Bartusiak 1990, 88). She eventually attended Vassar College in New
    York, which was also attended by Maria Mitchell, the first professional female
    astronomer in the United States. When she graduated, she was the only
    Astronomy major. She earned her masters degree at Cornell and her PhD
    from Georgetown University. In 1965, she received a research position at the
    Carnegie Institutions Department of Terrestrial Magnetism and continued her
    work there for the rest of her career (Bahcall 2017).
    Vera Rubins important work revolves around measuring how fast
    galaxies spin from their centers to their fringes. She found that they spin so
    fast that they should fall apart, stars falling off as gravity declines. The
    explanation she found for these flat rotation curves is that galaxies are
    kept intact by being embedded in dark matter, which is matter that we
    cannot detect which makes up at least 85 percent of the universe (Bartusiak
    1990, 88)(Bahcall 2017). To make these conclusions, Rubin worked with
    fellow astronomer Kent Ford for many years doing extensive studies, and she
    confirmed the existence of dark matter which had been proposed in 1933 by
    Fritz Zwicky, a Swiss astrophysicist (Domonoske 2016)(Bartusiak 1990).
    Vera Cooper Rubin was a pioneer for female astronomers. She was not
    admitted to Princetons astronomy program because she was a woman, was
    the first woman to be allowed in to observe at Caltechs Palomar
    Observatory, and advocated for women publically to be admitted to scientific
    organizations and institutions (Domonoske 2016). She is quotes to have
    written:
    I live and work with three basic assumptions:
    1.) There is no problem in science that can be solved by a man
    that cannot be solved by a woman.
    2.) Worldwide, half of all brains are in women.
    3.) We all need permission to do science, but, for reasons that
    are deeply ingrained in history, this permission is more often
    given to men than women. (Domonoske 2016)
    As an advocate for scientific research and for women in science, Vera
    Cooper Rubin broke every glass ceiling in the book as one of the worlds
    most important modern astronomers, setting an amazing example for
    women in all branches of science. Her discoveries have shaped modern
    science and will continue to be influential for a long time.
    Bibliography
    Bahcall, Neta A. 2017. "Vera Rubin (1928-2016)." Nature 542 (7639).
    Bartusiak, Marcia. 1990. "The Woman who Spins the Stars." Discover 11 (10):
    88-94.
    Domonoske, Camila. 2016. "Vera Rubin, Who Confirmed Existence Of Dark
    Matter, Dies At 88." NPR: The Two-Way. December 26. Accessed March
    3, 2017. http://www.npr.org/sections/thetwo-
    way/2016/12/26/507022497/vera-rubin-who-confirmed-existence-of-
    dark-matter-dies-at-88.
    Larsen, Kristen. 2009. "Vera Cooper Rubin." Jewish Women: A
    Comprehensive Historical Encyclopedia. March 1. Accessed March 3,
    2017. https://jwa.org/encyclopedia/article/rubin-vera-cooper.

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