Jane Rigby

Jane Rigby is an American astronomer, the James Webb Space Telescope senior project scientist at NASA, and a social activist in the astronomy community.[1][2][3] She was awarded the Presidential Medal of Freedom in 2024.[1] The medal is the highest US civilian award.[1] President Biden presented the award to her for her work on the James Webb Space Telescope.[1] The James Webb Telescope is one of NASA’s multi-billion dollar instruments in space.[1][2] The telescope helps take images of deep space.[1][2][3] Jane Rigby is the senior project scientist.[1] This means she helps keep the telescope working.[2] The telescope has found many discoveries in deep space.[1][2][3] Jane Rigby has worked with many other important telescopes in her career, like the Hubble Space Telescope, Spritzer, the Keck Telescopes, and the Chandra x-ray Telescope.[1] She also wrote around 150 papers on her discoveries in her career.[1]

Early life

She was always interested in space and wanted to be an astronaut when she was a child.[2][3] Jane Rigby got a masters and doctoral degree in astronomy at the University of Arizona.[1]  

Activism

She helps make queer astronauts and other groups that struggle to become astronomers more welcome in the astronomy community.[3] She has been helping set up meetings to advocate for those groups during her career.[3]

References

  1. 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 Ravisetti, Monisha (2024-05-09). "James Webb Space Telescope chief scientist Jane Rigby receives highest US civilian award". Space. Retrieved 2025-04-18.
  2. 1 2 3 4 5 6 "Jane Rigby helped make the James Webb telescope a superstar". 2025-02-03. Retrieved 2025-04-18.
  3. 1 2 3 4 5 6 Sharp, Andrew (2023-05-23). "This Delaware Native Oversees a $10 Billion Telescope at NASA". Delaware Today. Retrieved 2025-04-18.
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