--- title: Google Doodle Honors Scientist Hertha Marks Ayrton description: Google's doodle honors the female scientist for her scientific discoveries and victories over discrimination. canonical: https://time.com/4310634/google-doodle-scientist-hertha-marks-ayrton-ripples-gender/ author: TIME Staff article:opinion: false article:content_tier: free article:published_time: 2016-04-28T07:59:57.000Z article:modified_time: 2026-04-13T07:31:55.439Z og:title: Google Doodle Honors British Scientist Hertha Marks Ayrton og:description: She made breakthrough discoveries and tackled gender discrimination in science og:url: https://time.com/4310634/google-doodle-scientist-hertha-marks-ayrton-ripples-gender/ og:site_name: TIME og:image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blt6a5ad0cc4918efa3/698890f7cf40a8697ac43040/hertha-marks-ayrton.jpg?branch=production&width=1440&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=16:9 og:image:width: 1200 og:image:height: 675 og:image:alt: hertha-marks-ayrton og:type: article twitter:card: summary_large_image twitter:title: Google Doodle Honors British Scientist Hertha Marks Ayrton twitter:description: She made breakthrough discoveries and tackled gender discrimination in science twitter:image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blt6a5ad0cc4918efa3/698890f7cf40a8697ac43040/hertha-marks-ayrton.jpg?branch=production&width=1440&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=16:9 ---  # Google Doodle Honors Scientist Hertha Marks Ayrton by [TIME Staff](https://time.com/author/time-staff/) ## TIME Staff Apr 28, 2016 7:59 AM UTC  Google's doodle for Hertha Marks Ayrton, April 28, 2016 Google's doodle for Hertha Marks Ayrton, April 28, 2016Google by [TIME Staff](https://time.com/author/time-staff/) ## TIME Staff Apr 28, 2016 7:59 AM UTC Hertha Marks Ayrton became the first woman to [present](https://royalsociety.org/news/2010/influential-british-women/) her own work to the U.K.’s Royal Society when she stood in front of the scientific academy in 1904 and read “The Origin and Growth of Ripple Marks.” Until then, scientists were baffled by the creation of ridges in sand when a wave washes over a beach. To celebrate Ayrton’s scientific discoveries and victories over discrimination, Google has honored the British engineer, mathematician, physicist and inventor with a [Doodle](http://www.google.com/doodles/hertha-marks-ayrtons-162nd-birthday), on the 162nd anniversary of her birth. In addition to unlocking the mystery of ripples, Ayrton also became and expert on electric arcs, widely used in lighting at the time. In 1906, the [Royal Society](https://royalsociety.org/news/2010/influential-british-women/) awarded Ayrton with its prestigious Hughes Medal for her contributions to physical sciences. But the academy denied her the honor of becoming a fellow, because she was married. Addressing this kind of gender discrimination in science, Ayrton [wrote](http://jwa.org/encyclopedia/article/ayrton-hertha-marks): “An error that ascribes to a man what was actually the work of a woman has more lives than a cat.” ```json [{"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"NewsArticle","@id":"https://time.com/4310634/google-doodle-scientist-hertha-marks-ayrton-ripples-gender/","mainEntityOfPage":{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https://time.com/4310634/google-doodle-scientist-hertha-marks-ayrton-ripples-gender/"},"headline":"Google Doodle Honors Scientist Hertha Marks Ayrton","datePublished":"2016-04-28T07:59:57.000Z","dateModified":"2026-04-13T07:31:55.439Z","description":"She made breakthrough discoveries and tackled gender discrimination in science","url":"https://time.com/4310634/google-doodle-scientist-hertha-marks-ayrton-ripples-gender/","keywords":["Newsfeed","gender","Discrimination","Google Doodle","Scientist"],"thumbnailUrl":"https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blt6a5ad0cc4918efa3/698890f7cf40a8697ac43040/hertha-marks-ayrton.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=1200:675&height=675","author":[{"@type":"Person","name":"TIME Staff","jobTitle":null,"url":"https://time.com/author/time-staff/"}],"articleSection":"","image":[{"@type":"ImageObject","url":"https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blt6a5ad0cc4918efa3/698890f7cf40a8697ac43040/hertha-marks-ayrton.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=1200:675&height=675","width":1200,"height":675,"headline":"hertha-marks-ayrton","caption":"Hertha Marks Ayrton","creditText":"Google","representativeOfPage":true}],"publisher":{"@type":"Organization","name":"Time","url":"https://time.com/","logo":{"@type":"ImageObject","url":"https://time.com/images/logo.png","width":528,"height":156},"foundingDate":"March 3, 1923","sameAs":["https://www.facebook.com/time","https://www.instagram.com/time/?hl=en","https://twitter.com/time","https://www.pinterest.com/timemagazine"]}},{"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"BreadcrumbList","itemListElement":[{"@type":"ListItem","position":1,"item":{"@id":"/tag/time-section-newsfeed/","name":"Newsfeed"}},{"@type":"ListItem","position":2,"item":{"@id":"https://time.com/4310634/google-doodle-scientist-hertha-marks-ayrton-ripples-gender/","name":"Google Doodle Honors Scientist Hertha Marks Ayrton"}}]}] ```