Dr. Eisberg is examining the life of the astronomer, Beatrice Tinsley (1941-1981). Despite her short career, Tinsley is significant to both the intellectual and the social history of science. Tinsley's career exemplifies many of the most striking difficulties encountered by female scientists. Nevertheless, she played a central role in originating the modern study of the evolution of stellar populations and galaxies, now among the most active fields of astronomy, and a field with crucial links to cosmology. Dr. Eisberg's study promises to place Tinsley's scientific work in context of the history of stellar and galactic astrophysics and cosmology as well as the history of women in science. She has access to Tinsley's large collection of scientific papers and family correspondence. She is also able to conduct interviews with many of Tinsley's surviving colleagues. This study will allow Dr. Eisberg to explore gender differences in the practice of science as well as the social and intellectual history of astronomy. Thus, it promises to have significance not just for STS scholars, but also astronomers and those interested in the advance of women in science.
