Professor Edvard Bela was a male human scientist that resided on a Maquis inhabited world in the Alpha Quadrant that was at the core of the resistance against the Cardassian inspired treaty.
His conceptual research stated that if Bela-energy was forced into a circular path then it was capable of creating a subspace tunnel of such intensity that it exploded along its only available point of expansion; either forward or backward. This essentially led to the development of an artificial wormhole. While groundbreaking, the means through which this was possible was beyond Federation science. The ancient Furies in the Delta Quadrant were capable of producing such effects in their quest to return to the Alpha Quadrant.
Another pioneering piece of research made by the scientist were Bela-Neutron devices. (VOY novel: The Final Fury)