Bertha Swirles, Lady Jeffreys (22 May 1903 – 18 December 1999), carried out research on quantum theory

Quantum mechanics

Quantum mechanics, also known as quantum physics or quantum theory, is a branch of physics providing a mathematical description of much of the dual particle-like and wave-like behavior and interactions of energy and matter. It departs from classical mechanics primarily at the atomic and subatomic...

, particularly in its early days. She was associated with Girton College

Girton College, Cambridge

Girton College is one of the 31 constituent colleges of the University of Cambridge. It was England's first residential women's college, established in 1869 by Emily Davies and Barbara Bodichon. The full college status was only received in 1948 and marked the official admittance of women to the...

, University of Cambridge

University of Cambridge

The University of Cambridge is a public research university located in Cambridge, United Kingdom. It is the second-oldest university in both the United Kingdom and the English-speaking world , and the seventh-oldest globally...

, as student and Fellow, for over 70 years.

Bertha Swirles was born in Northampton in 1903, attended Northampton School for Girls

Northampton School For Girls

Northampton School for Girls is a girls-only comprehensive secondary school in Northampton, England.In 2004, the school gained specialist Music College status, the first school in England to do so, and as a result provides a wide range of musical opportunities for both its students and the local...

 and then went up to Girton College, in 1921, to read Mathematics, graduating with first class Honours. She became a research student of Ralph Fowler, one of a distinguished company of his students that included Paul Dirac

Paul Dirac

Paul Adrien Maurice Dirac, OM, FRS was an English theoretical physicist who made fundamental contributions to the early development of both quantum mechanics and quantum electrodynamics...

 and Subrahmanyan Chandrasekhar

Subrahmanyan Chandrasekhar

Subrahmanyan Chandrasekhar, FRS ) was an Indian origin American astrophysicist who, with William A. Fowler, won the 1983 Nobel Prize for Physics for key discoveries that led to the currently accepted theory on the later evolutionary stages of massive stars...

. She married Harold Jeffreys

Harold Jeffreys

Sir Harold Jeffreys, FRS was a mathematician, statistician, geophysicist, and astronomer. His seminal book Theory of Probability, which first appeared in 1939, played an important role in the revival of the Bayesian view of probability.-Biography:Jeffreys was born in Fatfield, Washington, County...

 in 1940, and became Lady Jeffreys upon his knighthood in 1953.

Some early scientific publications

• Bertha Swirles, The internal conversion of -rays, Proceedings of the Royal Society of London, Series A, Vol. 116, No. 774, pp. 491-500 (1927). http://www.jstor.org/view/09501207/ap000484/00a00110/0 This paper dates from the time when Bertha Swirles was Yarrow Research Student at Girton College.
• Bertha Swirles, The internal conversion of Gamma-rays. — Part II, Proceedings of the Royal Society of London, Series A, Vol. 121, No. 787, pp. 447-456 (1928). http://www.jstor.org/view/09501207/ap000497/00a00310/0 This paper dates from the time when Bertha Swirles was Hertha Ayrton Research Fellow at Girton College.
• Bertha Swirles, The coefficients of absorption and opacity of a partially degenerate gas, Proceedings of the Royal Society of London, Series A, Vol. 141, No. 845, pp. 554-566 (1933). http://www.jstor.org/view/09501207/ap000555/00a00070/0
• Bertha Swirles, The relativistic self-consistent field, Proceedings of the Royal Society of London, Series A, Vol. 152, No. 877, pp. 625-649 (1935). http://www.jstor.org/view/00804630/ap000587/00a00080/0
• Bertha Swirles, The relativistic interaction of two electrons in the self-consistent field method, Proceedings of the Royal Society of London, Series A, Vol. 157, No. 892, pp. 680-696 (1936). http://www.jstor.org/view/00804630/ap000602/00a00160/0
• D. R. Hartree
  Douglas Hartree
  Douglas Rayner Hartree PhD, FRS was an English mathematician and physicist most famous for the development of numerical analysis and its application to the Hartree-Fock equations of atomic physics and the construction of the meccano differential analyser.-Early life:Douglas Hartree was born in...
  
  , W. Hartree, and Bertha Swirles, Self-consistent field, including exchange and superposition of configurations, with some results for Oxygen, Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society of London, Series A, Vol. 238, No. 790, pp. 229-247 (1939). http://www.jstor.org/view/00804614/ap000684/00a00000/0

Book

• Sir Harold Jeffreys and Bertha Swirles (Lady Jeffreys), Methods of Mathematical Physics, third revised edition (Cambridge University Press, 1956 — reprinted 1999). This book, first published in 1946, is commonly referred to as Jeffreys & Jeffreys. ISBN 0-521-66402-0, ISBN 978-0-521-66402-8.

Some biographical sketches by Bertha Swirles

• Bertha Swirles, John Arthur Gaunt (1904-1944), Notes and Records of the Royal Society of London, Vol. 44, No. 1, pp. 73-79 (1990). http://www.jstor.org/view/00359149/ap020075/02a00050/0
• Bertha Swirles, Reminiscences and Discoveries: Harold Jeffreys from 1891 to 1940, Notes and Records of the Royal Society of London, Vol. 46, No. 2, pp. 301-308 (1992). http://www.jstor.org/view/00359149/ap020080/02a00080/0

Obituaries

• R. M. Williams, Obituary: Bertha Jeffreys, The Independent (London), Wednesday, 22 December 1999. http://www.physics.ucla.edu/~cwp/articles/jeffreys/jeffreys-obituary.html, http://www.independent.co.uk/
• Mary Walmsley, Lady Jeffreys 1903-1999, The Mathematical Gazette, Vol. 84, No. 500, pp. 321-323 (2000). http://links.jstor.org/sici?sici=0025-5572(200007)2%3A84%3A500%3C321%3AOLJ1%3E2.0.CO%3B2-B
• J. A. Hudson, Lady Bertha Swirles, 1903-1999, Astronomy & Geophysics, Vol. 41, No. 3. 36-37 (2000). http://www.ingentaconnect.com/content/bsc/aag/2000/00000041/00000003/art00020

External links

• CWP at UCLA: Bertha Swirles, Lady Jeffreys
• The papers of Bertha Swirles (Lady Jeffreys) have just been processed by the NCUACS, Bath, England http://www.bath.ac.uk/ncuacs/
• Portrait by Julia Hedgecoe, 19 March 1998, National Portrait Gallery, London.