More Words, Deeper Hole

Scientists doing science, or stories where the focus is on the science? For the later, some baxter might qualify, although he's going to be mostly applied astrophysics.

For the former: some Jack McDevitt, for archeology and anthropology.
Charles Sheffield must have had someone doing science, but I can't seem to think of anything.
I never read much Robert L. Forward, but I seem to recall _RocheWorld_ as a book mostly about the science of planetary systems. IIRC _Alpha Centauri_ had some scientists doing science as well, I thought, although it was of course mostly background for Barton and Capobianco's gedankenexperiment in social dysfunction.

There is probably a fair bit of short fiction from Analog that fits the bill, most likely involving an iconoclastic lone scientist overthowing the established order.