Maria Goeppert Mayer

About Maria Goeppert Mayer

Maria Goeppert Mayer (1906–1972) was an exceptional theoretical physicist whose HPI score places her as the 737th most historically influential figure globally. Her most significant contribution was the development of the nuclear shell model, which successfully explained the structure of atomic nuclei, earning her the Nobel Prize in Physics in 1963. This work cemented her place among the giants of 20th-century science, a recognition reflected in her high historical importance ranking.

However, her digital footprint in 2025 shows a notable attention gap. Goeppert Mayer garnered approximately 67K Wikipedia views last year. When contrasted with fellow physicist James Clerk Maxwell, who ranks slightly lower in historical importance (#881) but received 531K views, her underattention is stark-roughly 8x less attention than her peer. This suggests a significant disparity between her documented scientific impact and modern internet visibility.

Despite this relative lag, the momentum data shows a positive sign for her contemporary relevance, with a 21% surge in interest between Q1 and Q3 of 2025, although the year-over-year change remained slightly negative at -0.8%.