Vera Rubin, the 'Mother of Dark Matter,' Has Died

PRINCETON, NJ — Vera Rubin, the astronomer who changed the way we see the universe, died Sunday, her family said. Rubin, a pioneer in the study of dark matter, was 88 years old. According to her son, the Philadelphia native died of natural causes in her adoptive town of Princeton, New Jersey.

“Vera Rubin was a national treasure as an accomplished astronomer and a wonderful role model for young scientists,” said Matthew Scott, president of the Carnegie Institution, where she did much of her pioneering work on the behavior of galaxies. “We are very saddened by this loss.”

It was four decades ago when Rubin and her partner realized that stars in the furthest reaches of the galaxy seemed to be defying Newton’s theory of gravity, leading to the discovery of dark matter. Dark matter, we now know, makes up a vast chunk of the universe.

“Vera was an amazing scientist and an amazing human being,” said her Princeton University colleague, Neta Bahcall. “A pioneering astronomer, the ‘mother' of flat rotation curves and dark-matter, a champion of women in science, a mentor and role model to generations of astronomers.”

An ardent feminist who spent her lifetime advocating for other women in the sciences, Rubin was the first woman allowed to observe at the Palomar Observatory. She was born 1928 in Washington, and she earned her Ph.D. from Georgetown University, where she then taught for 10 years. In 1993, she earned the nation’s highest scientific award, the National Medal of Science. In 1996, she became the first woman to receive the Royal Astronomical Society’s Gold Medal since Caroline Hershel, who was awarded the prize in 1828, according to the Carnegie Institution.

Rubin and her husband, Robert J. Rubin, a mathematician and physicist, had four children, all of whom acquired doctorates in the sciences or mathematics. Her daughter Judy Young, who died in 2014, followed in her mother's footsteps in astronomy. She is survived by her son, David Rubin, a geologist; son Karl Rubin, a mathematician; and Allan Rubin, a geologist.

Photo courtesy of the Carnegie Institution