This guitarist walked away from a mountaintop full of half-analysed observations in the 1970s because his band had started doing rather well. Thirty-odd years later he went back, finished the write-up, sat the viva, and collected a PhD in astrophysics at sixty.
The full story
Brian May began doctoral research in astrophysics at Imperial College London in 1970 and set it aside as Queen became successful. Imperial College awarded him a PhD in October 2007 for a thesis titled 'A survey of radial velocities in the zodiacal dust cloud', built on more than 250 scans of the Zodiacal Light made at the Teide Observatory in Tenerife across two observing periods, September to October 1971 and April 1972, using a spectrometer he helped construct. He was 60. He has since collaborated with NASA's New Horizons team on stereo imagery from the Kuiper Belt flyby of 1 January 2019, and was appointed Knight Bachelor for services to music and charity, receiving the accolade from King Charles III at Buckingham Palace on 14 March 2023.
The clues we handed out
— The observations came from two runs at the Teide Observatory in Tenerife — September to October 1971, and April 1972 — using a spectrometer he had helped build.
— There are more than 250 of them, and the thesis is titled 'A survey of radial velocities in the zodiacal dust cloud'.
— Imperial College London awarded the degree in October 2007. He had started the research there in 1970.
— He worked with NASA's New Horizons team on the Kuiper Belt flyby of 1 January 2019, was knighted in 2023, and plays a guitar he built with his father out of a fireplace mantel.
— Initials: B.M.
How this case played
ALLEGEDLY* edition No. 97. Three strikes to name Brian May, with a free clue
unlocked after every miss.
Where this comes from
Every case on this site is drawn from the public record. These are the records for this one.
*A blind item you can check. Every puzzle is drawn from the public record —
court records, official rulings, and moments that unfolded on live television — and the
records are linked above. Allegedly.
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