Most stars don't do just one thing. In other words, someone's favorite actor or musician is probably not just an actor or musician. Many stars are double, even triple threats. Some can act and sing, some can act and direct, some can sing and dance and act, etc. But some can act and advance science and technology for the greater good of humanity.
Some stars are indeed respected scientists whose research has been published in peer-reviewed journals, and some have inventions and discoveries to their already famous names. Natalie Portman, Lisa Kudrow, and guitarist Brian May all have done wonderful things for the world of science. And one iconic Hollywood starlet laid the foundation for the way we live our lives in the 21st century with her inventions.
10 Natalie Portman
Portman received a degree in psychology from Harvard in 2003. She was conducting her studies while still filming the Star Wars prequels. She has coauthored not one, but two pieces and one was published before she had finished her time at Harvard. Also, her first piece was based on work she had begun in high school. Her first paper made the case that biodegradable waste can be used to generate energy, and her second piece talked about the activation of the frontal lobe as the brain registers object permanence.
9 Lisa Kudrow
Although she is famous for playing Phoebe Buffay, the airhead hippie on Friends, in real life Lisa Kudrow is an accomplished biologist. She graduated with a degree in biology from Vassar College and is a qualified physician specializing in the treatment of headaches. Kudrow coauthored a psychology paper titled "Handedness and Headache" in 1991, three years before she got her role on Friends.
8 Ken Jeong
Jeong is a fully qualified medical doctor, most people are aware of that by now as the actor has mentioned it in several interviews. Coincidentally, it was his role as the doctor in Knocked Up that launched his career. However, they might not be aware that he has more than medical degrees. Jeong also has a bachelor's degree in Zoology. He received his medical degrees from Duke University and the University of North Carolina.
7 Terri Hatcher
The Desperate Housewives star comes from a very scientific family. Her mother was a computer programmer and her father a nuclear physicist. It is no surprise then that the actress decided to get a degree in mathematics and engineering, both from De Anza college.
6 Mayim Bialik
Bialik does not just play a neuroscientist on The Big Bang Theory, she is one in real life. Bialik graduated with a Ph.D. from UCLA in 2007. Her graduate thesis was titled "Hypothalamic regulation in relation to maladaptive, obsessive-compulsive, affiliative, and satiety behaviors in Prader-Willi syndrome." One can't help but wonder if she ever gave the Big Bang writers notes to make sure their science jokes were accurate.
5 Brian May
In the hit Queen song "Bohemian Rhapsody," we hear Freddie Mercury belt "Galileo Galileo!" in homage to the renaissance astrophysicist. Well, that reference might have had a deeper meaning than the people who sing this song at karaoke night realize. Queen's guitarist Brian May is indeed an astrophysicist. His studies began in 1970, but he put his scientific career aside to focus on music. He returned to his studies several decades later and published his Ph.D. thesis "A Survey of Radial Velocities in the Zodiacal Dust Cloud" in 2007.
4 Danica Mckellar
The star of the 1980s comedy-drama The Wonder Years slowed down her acting to focus on a STEM career. She has authored several books encouraging young girls to get into STEM and graduated from UCLA in 1998 where she also published her thesis "Percolation and Gibbs states multiplicity for ferromagnetic Ashkin–Teller models" whatever those are. She also continues to act and is in shows like Young Justice and How I Met Your Mother. She also once competed on Dancing With The Stars.
3 Art Garfunkel
The other half of the folk duo Simon and Garfunkel could have had a much different career had he gone with his original plan to become a teacher. Garfunkel has a master’s degree in mathematics from Columbia University. He did briefly teach math at a prep school in Connecticut in 1971 but left to focus on music and occasionally acting.
2 Dolph Lundgren
Lundgren looks more like the guy who would bully scientists than he does an academic, but it just goes to show people should not judge someone on appearance. The muscle-bound actor from Aquaman and Rocky IV got a degree in chemical engineering from the KTH Royal Institute of Technology and a master's degree from the University of Sydney in 1982.
1 Hedy Lamarr
Lamarr was one of the most iconic stars from the Golden Age of Hollywood. The sultry star was much more than a pretty face though. Lamarr is responsible for several patents in wireless and radio technology that would eventually become the foundation for WiFi, GPS, and Bluetooth communication systems. This iconic star quite literally laid the foundation for the technology of the 21st century, yet most just remember her as a pretty actress from Austria.
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