Michele Karen Dougherty One or more of the preceding sentences incorporates text from the royalsociety.org website where: (born 1962) is a British space scientist who is

professor Professor (commonly abbreviated as Prof.) is an Academy, academic rank at university, universities and other tertiary education, post-secondary education and research institutions in most countries. Literally, ''professor'' derives from Latin ...

space physics Space physics, also known as space plasma physics, is the study of naturally occurring plasmas within Earth's upper atmosphere and the rest of the Solar System. It includes the topics of aeronomy, aurorae, planetary ionospheres and magnetospheres, ...

Imperial College London Imperial College London, also known as Imperial, is a Public university, public research university in London, England. Its history began with Prince Albert of Saxe-Coburg and Gotha, Prince Albert, husband of Queen Victoria, who envisioned a Al ...

. from

The Life Scientific ''The Life Scientific'' is a BBC Radio 4 science programme, presented by Jim Al-Khalili, in which each episode is dedicated to the biography and work of a living scientist. The programme consists of an interview between Al-Khalili and the featur ...

She is leading unmanned exploratory missions to

Saturn Saturn is the sixth planet from the Sun and the second largest in the Solar System, after Jupiter. It is a gas giant, with an average radius of about 9 times that of Earth. It has an eighth the average density of Earth, but is over 95 tim ...

and

Jupiter Jupiter is the fifth planet from the Sun and the List of Solar System objects by size, largest in the Solar System. It is a gas giant with a Jupiter mass, mass more than 2.5 times that of all the other planets in the Solar System combined a ...

and is Principal Investigator for J-MAG – a

magnetometer A magnetometer is a device that measures magnetic field or magnetic dipole moment. Different types of magnetometers measure the direction, strength, or relative change of a magnetic field at a particular location. A compass is one such device, ...

for the

European Space Agency The European Space Agency (ESA) is a 23-member International organization, international organization devoted to space exploration. With its headquarters in Paris and a staff of around 2,547 people globally as of 2023, ESA was founded in 1975 ...

Jupiter Icy Moons Explorer The Jupiter Icy Moons Explorer (Juice, formerly JUICE) is an interplanetary spacecraft on its way to orbit and study three icy moons of Jupiter (planet), Jupiter: Ganymede (moon), Ganymede, Callisto (moon), Callisto, and Europa (moon), Europa ...

, launched in April 2023. She has been elected to serve as President of the

Institute of Physics The Institute of Physics (IOP) is a UK-based not-for-profit learned society and professional body that works to advance physics education, physics research, research and applied physics, application. It was founded in 1874 and has a worldwide ...

from October 2025 and was appointed to Executive Chair of the

Science and Technology Facilities Council The Science and Technology Facilities Council (STFC) is a United Kingdom government agency that carries out research in science and engineering, and funds UK research in areas including particle physics, nuclear physics, space science and astr ...

in September 2024.

Early life and education

Michele Dougherty became interested in outer space when she was ten years old, when her father built a 10-inch telescope through which she saw the moons of Jupiter and Saturn. Dougherty was educated at the

University of Natal The University of Natal was a university in the former South African province Natal which later became KwaZulu-Natal. The University of Natal no longer exists as a distinct legal entity, as it was incorporated into the University of KwaZulu- ...

where she was awarded a

PhD A Doctor of Philosophy (PhD, DPhil; or ) is a terminal degree that usually denotes the highest level of academic achievement in a given discipline and is awarded following a course of graduate study and original research. The name of the deg ...

in 1989 for research on wave-particle interactions in dispersive and

anisotropic media Anisotropy () is the structural property of non-uniformity in different directions, as opposed to isotropy. An anisotropic object or pattern has properties that differ according to direction of measurement. For example, many materials exhibit ver ...

Research

Dougherty left South Africa for a fellowship in Germany, working on applied mathematics, before moving to Imperial College London in 1991. She was appointed a Professor of Space Physics in 2004 and teaches undergraduates alongside her research. She is Head of the

Department of Physics Department may refer to: * Departmentalization, division of a larger organization into parts with specific responsibility Government and military *Department (administrative division), a geographical and administrative division within a country, ...

. Dougherty is the Principal Investigator for two major space missions; the NASA Cassini spacecraft that orbited Saturn and the ESA JUICE spacecraft that will orbit Jupiter's largest moon, Ganymede. Dougherty's work led to the discovery of an

atmosphere An atmosphere () is a layer of gases that envelop an astronomical object, held in place by the gravity of the object. A planet retains an atmosphere when the gravity is great and the temperature of the atmosphere is low. A stellar atmosph ...

containing water and

hydrocarbon In organic chemistry, a hydrocarbon is an organic compound consisting entirely of hydrogen and carbon. Hydrocarbons are examples of group 14 hydrides. Hydrocarbons are generally colourless and Hydrophobe, hydrophobic; their odor is usually fain ...

s around Saturn's moon

Enceladus Enceladus is the sixth-largest moon of Saturn and the 18th-largest in the Solar System. It is about in diameter, about a tenth of that of Saturn's largest moon, Titan. It is covered by clean, freshly deposited snow hundreds of meters thick, ...

— opening up new possibilities in the search for

extraterrestrial life Extraterrestrial life, or alien life (colloquially, aliens), is life that originates from another world rather than on Earth. No extraterrestrial life has yet been scientifically conclusively detected. Such life might range from simple forms ...

. Dougherty is distinguished by the

Royal Society The Royal Society, formally The Royal Society of London for Improving Natural Knowledge, is a learned society and the United Kingdom's national academy of sciences. The society fulfils a number of roles: promoting science and its benefits, re ...

"for her scientific leadership of the international

NASA The National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA ) is an independent agencies of the United States government, independent agency of the federal government of the United States, US federal government responsible for the United States ...

-ESA- ASI Cassini-Huygens mission to Saturn and its moons". As Principal Investigator of the operation, data collection and analysis of observations from the magnetic field instrument on board the Cassini spacecraft, she strongly contributed to improve our understanding of Saturn and the

Moons of Saturn The moons of Saturn are numerous and diverse, ranging from tiny moonlets only tens of meters across to the enormous Titan (moon), Titan, which is larger than the planet Mercury (planet), Mercury. There are 274 natural satellite, moons with con ...

. Dougherty cites the flybys of Saturn's moons as a highlight of her career; convincing the NASA spacecraft team to make a closer than usual approach “I watched the data coming back with my heart in my mouth because if we had messed up no one would have ever believed me again!". Before working on the Cassini-Huygens spacecraft, Dougherty was involved in the magnetometer team for the Jupiter analysis of the Ulysses mission. She was also Guest Investigator on the NASA Jupiter System Data Analysis Program as part of the Galileo uncrewed spacecraft. She regularly delivers public lectures and appears on national media. She was one of the guest scientists interviewed on

Jim Al-Khalili Jameel Sadik "Jim" Al-Khalili (; born 20 September 1962) is an Iraqi-British theoretical physicist and science populariser. He is professor of theoretical physics and chair in the public engagement in science at the University of Surrey. He is a ...

's ''The Life Scientific''.

Awards and honours

In 2007, Dougherty won the

Chree Medal and Prize The Edward Appleton Medal and Prize is awarded by the Institute of Physics for distinguished research in environmental physics, environmental, earth physics, earth or atmospheric physics. Originally named after Charles Chree, the British physici ...

from the Institute of Physics for "her contributions to the field of planetary magnetic fields and atmospheres and their interactions with the solar wind". Dougherty won the 2008

Hughes Medal The Hughes Medal is a silver-gilt medal awarded by the Royal Society The Royal Society, formally The Royal Society of London for Improving Natural Knowledge, is a learned society and the United Kingdom's national academy of sciences. T ...

of the

"for innovative use of magnetic field data that led to discovery of an atmosphere around one of

's moons and the way it revolutionised our view of the role of planetary moons in the

Solar System The Solar SystemCapitalization of the name varies. The International Astronomical Union, the authoritative body regarding astronomical nomenclature, specifies capitalizing the names of all individual astronomical objects but uses mixed "Sola ...

". She was the second woman ever to receive such an accolade, 102 years after Hertha Ayrton in 1906. Dougherty was elected a

Fellow of the Royal Society Fellowship of the Royal Society (FRS, ForMemRS and HonFRS) is an award granted by the Fellows of the Royal Society of London to individuals who have made a "substantial contribution to the improvement of natural science, natural knowledge, incl ...

in 2012 and was recognized by the UK

Science Council The Science Council is a UK organisation that was established by Royal Charter in 2003. The principal activity of The Science Council is the promotion of the advancement and dissemination of knowledge of and education in science pure and applie ...

as one of the 100 top UK living scientists. She was awarded a prestigious Royal Society Research Professorship in 2014. Dougherty was awarded the

Gold Medal of the Royal Astronomical Society The Gold Medal of the Royal Astronomical Society is the highest award given by the Royal Astronomical Society (RAS). The RAS Council have "complete freedom as to the grounds on which it is awarded" and it can be awarded for any reason. Past awar ...

for

geophysics Geophysics () is a subject of natural science concerned with the physical processes and Physical property, properties of Earth and its surrounding space environment, and the use of quantitative methods for their analysis. Geophysicists conduct i ...

in 2017, the fifth woman ever to receive the honour. Dougherty has contributed significantly to the UK space sector, and chaired the Science Programme Advisory Committee of the UK Space Agency between 2014 and 2016. She was made Commander of the Order of the British Empire (CBE) in the

2018 New Year Honours The 2018 New Year Honours are appointments by some of the 16 Commonwealth realms to Orders and decorations of the Commonwealth realms, various orders and honours to recognise and reward good works by citizens of those countries. The New Year Hono ...

for "services to UK Physical Science Research". Dougherty won the 2018

Richard Glazebrook Medal and Prize The Richard Glazebrook Medal and Prize is awarded annually by the Institute of Physics to recognise leadership in the field of physics. It was established in 1966 and named in honour of Sir Richard T. Glazebrook, the first president of the Insti ...

from the

. In 2019 Dougherty was named a Fellow of the

American Geophysical Union The American Geophysical Union (AGU) is a 501(c)(3) nonprofit organization of Earth, Atmospheric science, atmospheric, Oceanography, ocean, Hydrology, hydrologic, Astronomy, space, and Planetary science, planetary scientists and enthusiasts that ...

. In 2019, Dougherty was named a fellow of the

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Dougherty, Michele Karen Academics of Imperial College London Female fellows of the Royal Society Living people University of Natal alumni Fellows of the Royal Astronomical Society British physicists Fellows of the Royal Society British women physicists 1962 births Commanders of the Order of the British Empire Recipients of the Gold Medal of the Royal Astronomical Society Fellows of the American Geophysical Union Planetary scientists Women planetary scientists

Early life and education

Research

Awards and honours

See also

References