Antony Hewish

Antony Hewish was a highly influential British radio astronomer. He spent much of his career studying the universe through radio waves. Radio astronomy allows scientists to observe objects that do not emit much visible light. Hewish is best known for his decisive role in the discovery of pulsars. These are rapidly rotating stars that emit regular pulses of radiation. His work helped transform our understanding of the cosmos.

To make his discoveries, Hewish developed advanced methods of observation. In 1952, he completed a PhD thesis regarding astronomical radio sources. He studied how foreground plasma causes scintillations. Scintillation is a twinkling effect seen in radio signals. He proposed building a large phased array radio telescope to study this. This design allowed for surveys at a high time resolution. In 1965, he secured funding for the Interplanetary Scintillation Array. This massive instrument was completed in 1967 at the Mullard Radio Astronomy Observatory.

The discovery of pulsars happened through the work of a research team. Jocelyn Bell was a PhD student working under Hewish. She helped build the array and analyzed the resulting data. Bell noticed a specific radio source that behaved strangely. Hewish initially suspected the signal was radio frequency interference from Earth. However, the signal remained at a constant right ascension. This fixed position in the sky proved it was a celestial source. This source was eventually identified as the first pulsar.

Hewish received several prestigious awards for his scientific contributions. In 1969, he was awarded the Eddington Medal by the Royal Astronomical Society. He was also elected a Fellow of the Royal Society in 1968. The most famous honor came in 1974 when he won the Nobel Prize in Physics. He shared this prize with Martin Ryle. They were recognized for their work on radio aperture synthesis. This technique helps create clearer images of the sky.

The Nobel Prize award led to some significant scientific controversy. While Hewish and Ryle received the prize, Jocelyn Bell was excluded. Astronomer Fred Hoyle argued that Bell deserved a share of the award. Despite this, Bell herself stated that research students should not usually receive Nobel Prizes. Michael Rowan-Robinson noted that Hewish was a major player in the process. He credited Hewish with inventing the scintillation technique in 1952. Hewish also led the team and provided the necessary interpretation of the data.

Hewish held many important academic positions throughout his life. He served as a professor of radio astronomy at the Cavendish Laboratory from 1971 to 1989. From 1982 to 1988, he was the head of the Mullard Radio Astronomy Observatory. He also had a strong connection to the Royal Institution in London. He delivered the Royal Institution Christmas Lecture in 1965. Later, he became a Professor of Astronomy there between 1976 and 1981. He was also a fellow of Churchill College, Cambridge.

Beyond his professional work, Hewish had a deep interest in the nature of reality. He believed that science and religion were complementary. He noted that physics can often defy common-sense thinking. For example, he discussed how virtual particles behave in ways that are not intuitive. He felt that the deepest aspects of existence might go beyond human understanding. Hewish was born on May 11, 1924, and lived to be 97 years old. He died on September 13, 2021. His family donated his Nobel Prize medal to Churchill College after his death.