Dora Altbir Drullinsky
Third woman to win the National Prize for Exact Sciences, and the one who established nanoscience in Chile as a discipline with a home of its own.
When a magnetic material is shrunk down to the nanometre scale — millionths of a millimetre — it stops behaving like a fridge magnet. Shape matters, edges matter, and magnetic configurations appear that do not exist in the macroscopic world.
Altbir has spent decades theoretically modelling those configurations. In 2019 she became the third woman to win the Premio Nacional de Ciencias Exactas (Chile's national prize for the exact sciences).
Magnetic nanostructures, and what they are for
The Premio Nacional jury highlighted her "scientific work in the theoretical study of magnetic nanostructures", internationally recognised for its creativity and excellence. It is pencil-and-computer work: models of how magnetic moments arrange themselves in objects a few nanometres across.
But under her direction, CEDENNA — Chile's centre for nanoscience and nanotechnology — took that physics into things you can touch: more sustainable nanotechnological concrete, advanced sensors for mining, water-repellent textiles, self-cleaning footwear.
Born in Santiago
On 21 February.
Pontificia Universidad Católica de Chile
Licenciatura, master's and doctorate in Physics. Her doctoral thesis was supervised by Miguel Kiwi, also a Premio Nacional laureate.
Universidad de Santiago de Chile
Academic at the Physics Department; she would go on to become full professor.
CEDENNA
Executive director of the Centro para el Desarrollo de la Nanociencia y la Nanotecnología (Centre for the Development of Nanoscience and Nanotechnology).
Premio Nacional de Ciencias Exactas
Announced on 27 August.
Vice-Rector for Research and Innovation
Universidad Diego Portales.
Board member of the Academia Chilena de Ciencias
2025-2027 term.
What the jury said
The ruling recognised her contribution to the development of nanoscience and nanotechnology in the country, and explicitly highlighted four things beyond her research: training young scientists, science communication, her fight against gender stereotypes, and her scientific management.
The jury was chaired by Education Minister Marcela Cubillos and included Ennio Vivaldi, rector of the Universidad de Chile; Rafael Correa, rector of the Universidad de O'Higgins; María Cecilia Hidalgo, president of the Academia Chilena de Ciencias; and Guido Garay, Premio Nacional de Ciencias Exactas laureate for 2017.
What she talks about with data
In STEM careers women are underrepresented, and in physics, the presence of women is the lowest compared with other disciplines
Dora Altbir, 2019, translated from Spanish
All disciplines require diversity in their approaches, and we women bring that diversity, but also excellence.
Dora Altbir, 2019, translated from Spanish
About her own vocation, the explanation she gives is simpler: she found it incredible that the motion of bodies could be understood with so few equations.
What the sources do not quite settle
She was born on 21 February 1961 in Santiago and received the Premio Nacional de Ciencias Exactas 2019.
The Ministry of Education, the Ministry of Science and the press agree.
She did her Licenciatura, master's and doctorate at the Universidad Católica, under the supervision of Miguel Kiwi.
Recorded in her Universidad Católica profile and mentioned when she was inducted into the Paseo de la Ciencia (Walk of Science).
CEDENNA was founded in 2009.
The year appears in search summaries of the USACH and the centre's own pages, but could not be read on the primary source itself.
The year of the WIPO national award (Premio Nacional de la OMPI) she received.
She is the first Chilean woman to receive it, but the year could not be confirmed. One source suggests 2024.
She spent her childhood in Arica.
Only her Universidad Católica profile says so; no other source mentions it.
- Ministerio de Educación (2019). Comunicado oficial del Premio Nacional
View source → - Ministerio de Ciencia (2019). Fallo del jurado y su composición
View source → - Facultad de Física · Universidad Católica (2019). Entrevista extensa, fuente de sus citas
View source → - Universidad de Santiago de Chile. Perfil de su universidad
View source →
How to cite
This is free to reuse under CC BY 4.0, as long as you give credit.
FísicaEterna. (2026). Dora Altbir Drullinsky — biography, FísicaEterna. Retrieved [access date] from https://www.fisicaeterna.cl/en/biographies/dora-altbir
@misc{fisicaeterna_dora_altbir,
author = {FísicaEterna},
title = {Dora Altbir Drullinsky — biography, FísicaEterna},
year = {2026},
url = {https://www.fisicaeterna.cl/en/biographies/dora-altbir},
note = {CC BY 4.0}
}