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Michele Karen Dougherty FRS is a Professor of Space Physics at Imperial College London. She won the 2008 Hughes Medal of the Royal Society "for innovative use of magnetic field data that led to discovery of an atmosphere around one of Saturn's moons and the way it revolutionised our view of the role of planetary moons in the Solar System".
She was distinguished "for her scientific leadership of the international NASA-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 its moons. Her work has led to the discovery of a dynamic atmosphere with water and hydrocarbons constituents at Saturn's moon Enceladus. Such results had a strong impact on our view of planetary systems, opening up new possibilities for spacecraft missions to Saturn's moons in search for life.
Before working on the Cassini-Huygens spacecraft, Professor 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 unmanned spacecraft.
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