Payne-Scott, Ruby Violet

The biographical details are taken from the article by WM Goss and Claire Hooker published in the Australian Dictionary of Biography, Vol. 18, (MUP) 2012:

Ruby Violet Payne-Scott, physicist, radio astronomer and schoolteacher, was born on 28 May 1912 in Grafton, New South Wales, to Cyril Hermann Payne-Scott, a London-born accountant, and his wife Amy Sarah, née Neale. Ruby attended Sydney Girls' High School; she went on to the University of Sydney where she obtained first-class honours in mathematics and physics (BSc 1933; MSc 1936; Dip Ed 1938). She won the Norbert Quirk prize for mathematics and, jointly with R. H. Healey, the Deas Thomson and Walter Burfitt scholarships for physics.

Ruby secured work as a physicist with the cancer research committee at the University of Sydney, where her research concentrated on a recently discovered cancer treatment, radiation. She completed her master's thesis on the wave-length distribution of the scattered radiation in a medium traversed by a beam of X- or gamma rays. After her contract ended she taught at Woodlands Church of England Girls' Grammar School, Adelaide. In 1939 she was appointed librarian with Amalgamated Wireless (Australasia) Ltd in Sydney. The only woman on the professional staff, she was soon conducting research on problems in receiver design.

In 1941 Ruby and other young engineers from AWA familiar with research on receivers and transmission, were hired by the division of radio physics of the Council for Scientific and Industrial Research (Commonwealth Scientific and Industrial Research Organization) to conduct research into a new, secret defensive weapon, radar.

After World War II Ruby and others from the radio physics division formed one of only two teams of scientists in the world to use survey work to investigate the 'cosmic static', which was found to emanate from the sun, radio nebulae and other astronomical objects. Australia became a world leader in radio astronomy, with Ruby playing a central role alongside other pioneers such as Bernard Mills and John Bolton. Her research focused on solar noise, particularly its correlation with sunspot activity.

On 8 September 1944 Ruby married William Hall, a telephone mechanic. She left CSIRO and radio astronomy in 1951, when she was expecting her first child.

Ruby was an avid bushwalker and was also known for engaging her colleagues in political discussions, during which she vehemently espoused her left-wing opinions. She confronted inequality and injustice wherever she perceived it. From 1963 to 1974 she taught mathematics and science at Danebank Church of England School for Girls, Hurstville. Survived by her husband and their son and daughter, she died of presenile dementia on 25 May 1981. Her son Peter Hall, FRS, is an eminent mathematician; her daughter Fiona a well-known artist and photographer.

For the full article see:

http://adb.anu.edu.au/biography/payne-scott-ruby-violet-15036

accessed 18/5/2016