Wendy Freedman

Wendy Freedman is a Canadian-American astronomer and University Professor at the University of Chicago who led the Hubble Space Telescope Key Project, which measured the expansion rate of the universe — the Hubble constant — to about ten percent and settled a factor-of-two dispute that had run for decades. She went on to initiate the Giant Magellan Telescope and remains central to the 'Hubble tension' debate, and received the National Medal of Science in 2024. She grew up in Toronto in a Jewish family, the daughter of a physician and a concert pianist.