Leigh Royden

Leigh "Wiki" H. Royden is an American Geologist.

Early life

Royden was born in Palo Alto, California. Royden's father was Halsey Royden, a mathematician.

Education

Royden received an A.B. degree in physics from Harvard University and a PhD in geology and geophysics from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT).

Career

Royden became a member of the faculty at MIT in 1988. She is director of MIT's Experimental Study Group.[1][2]

Royden has published important papers on thermal subsidence at the northeastern continental margin of North America and on retreating subduction boundaries formed during the collision of continental tectonic plates.[1]

In 1990, she was awarded the Donath Medal (Young Scientist Award) by the Geological Society of America. Royden was named a fellow of the American Geophysical Union in 2004.[3] In 2011, she received the George P. Woollard Award.[1] In 2013, she was awarded the Stephan Mueller Medal by the European Geosciences Union.[2] In 2018, she was named to the American Academy of Arts and Sciences.[4]

In 1994, Royden was one of 16 women faculty in the School of Science at MIT who drafted and co-signed a letter to the then-Dean of Science (now Chancellor of Berkeley) Robert Birgeneau, which started a campaign to highlight and challenge gender discrimination at MIT.[5]

References

  1. ^ a b c "2011 George P. Woollard Award". Geological Society of America.
  2. ^ a b "Leigh Royden". MIT.
  3. ^ "Fellows - Tectonophysics". American Geophysical Union. Retrieved 2018-10-29.
  4. ^ "Royden, Seager Elected to the American Academy of Arts and Sciences". MIT. April 18, 2018.
  5. ^ Zernike, Kate (2023). The Exceptions: Nancy Hopkins, MIT, and the Fight for Women in Science. New York, NY: Scribner. ISBN 978-1-9821-3183-8.