In 1968, the prestigious journal ‘Nature’ published an article reporting on measuring radiation from stellar space that could have been produced by another intelligent way of life. Following the publication of this article, the world's media rushed to consider this phenomenon as the discovery of the year. However, there was a related element that grabbed media attention even more, if possible, than the discovery itself: the fact that a young and attractive PhD student had been involved in measuring the radiation.
After graduating in Natural Sciences, in 1965, she moved to Cambridge, where she completed her doctorate under the supervision of Antony Hewish, the first Nobel Laureate in Astrophysics.
Her PhD project was to build a radio telescope to study the newly discovered quasars. Jocelyn built that radio telescope herself with an astonishing resolution. She then conscientiously analyzed all the data personally. On November 28th, 1968, she first measured very mild radiation. Although it was initially considered to come from intelligent interplanetary life, it was she herself that, persevering in her measurements, dismissed this idea, as she managed to measure that radiation from a different angle of the star map. That radiation is what is now known as pulsar, a neutron star that rotates on itself and is the only object where matter can be observed at the nuclear level.
Jocelyn Bell Burnell published an article in 'Nature' that went around the world. Unfortunately, at the end of her PhD she married and left the front line of research to develop a dazzling and effective horizontal career. Her husband's dedication to diplomacy made her a kind of nomad. She became involved in research at the universities in the different cities in which she lived, and became an expert in various fields of Astrophysics, including gamma-ray astronomy, X-ray astronomy, infrared astronomy, and submillimeter astronomy.
In 1974, Antony Hewish was awarded the Nobel Prize in Physics, along with Martin Ryle. Jocelyn Bell was not mentioned alongside them, a lack of recognition that produced much disappointment in the scientific community.
Jocelyn later commented in an interview that she had suffered from what is known as "imposter syndrome" which is to believe that one is not worth enough, or that one is not smart enough. This is something that has been shown to be very common in female scientists.
Sources:
https://mujeresconciencia.com/2014/12/03/el-universo-de-jocelyn-bell-burnell/
https://es.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jocelyn_Bell_Burnell
https://hipertextual.com/2015/10/jocelyn-bell-astrofisica-nobel