Bertha Swirles, Lady Jeffreys was a British physicist who carried out research on quantum theory, particularly in its early days. She studied Mathematics at Girton College and received a double First in her exams, but was as a woman the university would not award her a degree. She received a titular PhD in 1929, and taught at the University of Manchester (1928-31, 1933-38), the University of Bristol (1931-32), and Imperial College, London (1932-33), before returning to Girton as a Fellow in 1938; she remained at Girton until her retirement thirty-one years later. She was president of the Mathematical Association for 1969. In 2016 the Council of the University of Cambridge approved the use of Swirles's name to mark Swirles Court, which consists of 350 graduate student rooms, leased by Girton College, within the North West Cambridge Development.
