Physicist
Dr. Chien-Shiung Wu (1912–1997) was a Chinese and American physicist.
FAST FACTS:
- She is known as “the First Lady of Physics” due to her research contributions in the field of physics
- Wu is best known for her work on the Manhattan Project, where she figured out how to separate Uranium metal by diffusion
- She created the Wu experiment, where she Disproved the Law of Conservation of Parity, which stated that identical nuclear particles don’t always act the same
- She graduated with a degree in physics from the National Central University in Nanking, China and went on to receive a Ph.D in Physics from the University of California at Berkeley in the U.S.
- She was the first female instructor at Princeton University
- She was the recipient of the Comstock Prize in Physics (1964), the Bonner Prize (1975), the National Medal of Science (1975), and the Wolf Prize in Physics (inaugural award, 1978).
- In 1965, she released her book Beta Decay which is still a standard reference for nuclear physicists
- She helped shape modern physics as we know it today and became a inspiration for all women in science
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