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75 news posts in WomeninScience

Frontiers news

24 Mar 2023

Rachel Schattman – Sustainable management & community engagement are the keys

Author: Rafa Tasnim Dr Rachel E Schattman is an Assistant Professor of Sustainable Agriculture at the University of Maine School of Food and Agriculture, where she leads a group of graduate students and staff scientists in the Agroecology Lab. She is also a fellow with The George J Mitchell Center for Sustainability Solutions and an associate of the University of Maine Climate Change Institute. Previously, Rachel served as a postdoctoral researcher at the United States Department of Agriculture Northeast Climate Hub, where her work focused on climate change and adaptation from agricultural perspectives, as well as designing curricula for adult learners.  In this blog post, we will discuss accessibility to clean water and sanitation as part of the United Nations Sustainable Development Goal 6 through the lens of Rachel’s research expertise and perspectives on sustainable agriculture and climate change. Photo credit: Karrah Kwasnik What encouraged you to work towards sustainability, more specifically on climate change issues and sustainable agriculture? “I believe that climate change is the biggest threat to human and non-human communities and ecosystems around the world, and that the danger it poses to our ability to grow food is worthy of our close attention. I did not start […]

Frontiers news

10 Mar 2023

Anna Savage – The canary in the coal mine

Author: Natasha Inskip Dr Anna Savage is an Associate Professor of Biology at the University of Central Florida. She previously completed her PhD in Ecology and Evolutionary Biology at Cornell University and was a postdoctoral fellow at the Smithsonian Institution. Recently, Anna has taken on the role of Specialty Chief Editor within the Behavior, Evolution, and Ecology section of Frontiers in Amphibian and Reptile Science.  The United Nations Sustainable Development Goal 15 Life on Land is about aiming to protect, restore, and promote sustainable use of terrestrial ecosystems, sustainably manage forests, combat desertification, and halt and reverse land degradation and halt biodiversity loss. In this blog, we will explore how Anna’s important work contributes to this goal.  Photo credit: Erin Brosnan Could you start by running us through your expertise and your main areas of research interest? “My background is in evolutionary biology and I care a lot about conservation of amphibians. Most of us know that they’re facing massive global declines and it’s been a conservation issue that was first in the news when I was a kid in the 1990s. That was a motivator that drove me to become a scientist from the start.  “As I became more […]

Featured news

10 Feb 2023

Kelly Thompson – Bringing sex and gender differences to the forefront

By Katharina StockDr Kelly Thompson is the Director of Research Operations at the Nepean Blue Mountains Local Health District in Western Sydney and an active researcher at The George Institute for Global Health. Having led the Global Women’s Health program at The George Institute as Program Manager, Kelly has more than five years of experience overseeing research on the health of women across the lifespan. Her personal research looks at critical infections and sepsis through an epidemiological lens with a focus on health equity and women’s health. Kelly and I discuss the role of reporting on sex and gender differences in disease, the importance of language when talking about these differences, and what is needed to achieve the United Nations Sustainable Development Goal 5.Kelly is currently serving as Associate Editor for Frontiers in Global Women’s Health. Photo credit: The George Institute for Global Health What made you want to pursue public health research, particularly focusing on health equity?  “I started in clinical nursing in intensive care and loved it. Clinical nursing felt like a bit of a calling to me because of the focus on helping people, though eventually I wanted to have an impact on a larger scale. Fundamentally, […]

Frontiers news

16 Jan 2023

Rachel Parker – They are the answer

Author: Carolina Capelo Garcia Rachel Parker is a Senior Research Fellow at the Australian Council for Educational Research (ACER). She has more than 20 years of experience in international education, including specific expertise in learning through play and global education. More specifically, Rachel has been leading, designing, evaluating, and managing education programs for development partners such as UNICEF, Australia’s Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade (DFAT), the Asian Development Bank, and the World Bank. Through ACER, Rachel leads Learning Through Play at School, a major four-year study on the benefits of playful pedagogies, as part of a joint project with the LEGO Foundation. She is also co-author of Frontiers in Education’s most viewed article of 2022, “Learning Through Play at School – A Framework for Policy and Practice” (Parker et al, 2022). Photo credit: Simone Norris What drove you to follow the path of education research, and more particularly, how did you end up exploring the importance of learning through play at an international level? “What drove me to education research was my curiosity. I also had this naïve desire to want to make a positive difference in the world. Before I worked in research, I worked in international development […]

Frontiers news

09 Dec 2022

2022: A year to remember

Author: Leticia Nani Silva As a young scientist, I ask myself daily, “What do you want to be remembered for?” Is it my career, my publications, my awards, or even all the conferences I attended? As a female scientist, I want to be remembered for making significant contributions to my field of work and for amplifying the voices of other female scientists to share their stories. Photo credit: Frontiers In 2019, before the world changed entirely, three other women and myself were enjoying the Swiss air from Frontiers’ Lausanne headquarters when we started discussing the importance of giving women in science more of a voice within their communities. As scientists ourselves, we felt it was our responsibility to create a space where women researchers would feel drawn to share their career progressions and achievements, as well as the obstacles and challenges they faced. We wanted to give them a platform where they would be remembered not only for their scientific breakthroughs, but even more so for their tenacity, passion, and dedication to uplifting the other women around them. It was at this moment that the Frontiers Women in Science blog was born. As the blog coordinator, I gathered a talented […]

Frontiers news

02 Dec 2022

Wendy Chapman – Successful digital health through diversity of thought

Author: Katharina Stock Professor Wendy Chapman is the Director of the Centre for Digital Transformation of Health at the University of Melbourne. The Centre focuses on the translation of digital health innovations into clinical practice, envisioning healthcare as a connected system. Recently, I had the opportunity to sit down with Wendy to discuss how she found her way into medical informatics, challenges people — especially women — face when pursuing a career in the field, and what motivates her to continue pushing for the digital transformation of healthcare despite its complex challenges.Professor Wendy Chapman currently serves as an Associate Editor for Frontiers in Digital Health. Photo credit: Francesco Vicenzi/Casamento Photography Your career in medical informatics started in a somewhat unexpected place. Can you talk a little bit about your passion for language and how this led to a career in natural language processing and medical informatics?  “I started out at university with a major in elementary education and as part of that major we had to take a linguistics class, which was my favorite class. I went to Hong Kong for a year and a half and while I was there I learned to speak Cantonese. I had never spoken […]

Featured news

11 Nov 2022

Monica Montgomery – Policies for Peace

Author: Lucy Thompson Monica Montgomery is the Political Director for the non-profit, non-partisan advocacy organization Council for a Livable World. The organization is dedicated to reducing the danger of nuclear weapons and eventually eliminating them through advocating sensible national security policies and helping elect congressional candidates who support them. Today, we discuss Monica’s journey into policymaking, the importance of representation, and the intersection of peace and policy within society.    Photo credit: Monica Montgomery What was your inspiration that led you to your current role?  I first became interested in nuclear arms control, non-proliferation, and disarmament work through my undergraduate studies at University of Notre Dame, where I had a professor who had extensively worked in Washington, DC on disarmament issues. He organized a trip to the Vatican for a conference that was hosted by Pope Francis himself on issues of nuclear disarmament. I attended this conference and I was really inspired by the message of the Pope. I’ve had Catholic schooling all my life, but this was not something that I had really ever engaged in or had ever thought of nuclear arms control within this sphere.  I think that a lot of the younger generation in the US, at […]

Frontiers news

28 Oct 2022

Aliyah Griffith – Mahogany Mermaids and Marine Marvels

Author: Thimedi Hetti I had a pleasure of speaking with Aliyah Griffith, PhD student at the University of North Carolina Chapel Hill, about her journey into marine science, setbacks, and achievements. With the research shift more towards coral reef management, Aliyah is hoping to partner with Barbados to explore the techniques while also partnering with the American Museum of Natural History in New York to review some of the pieces from their 4000-piece coral fossil collection. “I want to use the fossils to try and recreate what old reefs used to look like compared to newer ones,” Aliyah hopes. Photo credit: Frank Griffith So, how was Aliyah’s initial interest in marine science ignited? She always knew she liked animals and was fortunate to have visited many nature centers, aquariums, and zoos growing up. “Around the age of 8, I asked a dolphin trainer what her job was. When she answered ‘marine biologist’, I knew that was what I wanted to do. Later in high school, I did a shadowing program at an aquarium, worked at a veterinary hospital and a nature center to expose myself to multiple areas. Because of this exposure, I was certain I wanted to focus on […]

Featured news

12 Oct 2022

Francesca Altieri – From Maths to Mars

By Leticia Nani Silva For this article, I had the pleasure of interviewing Dr Francesca Altieri, a planetary science researcher at the Institute for Space Astrophysics and Planetology in Rome, Italy. Altieri focuses her research on the surface composition of solid bodies within the solar system. In this interview, our discussion is focused on how culture and tradition amongst families affect our decisions to pursue a career completely outside the expectations of our parents. Furthermore, we focus on the importance of taking big leaps of faith as well as how taking these leaps allows you to discover your own hidden talents. Photo credit: Corrado Spagnoli  Altieri’s main goal was to become a teacher. Her family encouraged her to go to university and study literature, philosophy, Greek, and Latin. It was only after speaking to a close family member that she saw the struggle of getting a job in that particular field which triggered a switch to STEM. “My brother was already at university at the time and encouraged me to join him. I decided, out of all the STEM subjects, I was going to study physics and astronomy,” Altieri comments on the fact that this choice in the subject did […]

Featured news

26 Sep 2022

Phoebe Koundouri and Marina Della Giusta – Women supporting women

By Leticia Nani Silva , Rocio Caverzasi and Geraldine Clancy To celebrate International Equal Pay Day, we speak to the new Field Chief Editors of our Economics journals Professor Phoebe Koundouri and Professor Marina Della Giusta. Photo redit: Mrs Kattirzi via Frontiers Professor Phoebe Koundouri is an economics professor and world ambassador for sustainable development. She is listed in the 1% of most-cited women economists in the world. She holds two professorship titles, one at the Athens University of Economics and Business, and the other at the Technical University of Denmark. In addition to her academic roles, Professor Koundouri is the founder and Chair of the Alliance of Excellent for Research and Innovation on Aeiphoria (AE4RIA), President of the  European Association of Environmental and Natural Resource Economists (EAERE), Chair of the SDSN Global Climate Hub, co-Chair of the United Nations Sustainable Development Solutions Network for Europe and Greece, Director of the Research Laboratory on Socio-Economic and Environmental Sustainability (ReSEES) at Athens University of Economics and Business, and of the  Sustainable Development Unit  & EIT Climate-KIC Hub Greece of the European Institute of Innovation and Technology at “Athena” Research and Innovation Center . Moreover, she is an elected member of Academia Europae […]

Featured news

12 Sep 2022

Karen Strier – Lessons from the world’s most peaceful primate

Author: Natasha Inskip  Dr Karen Strier is Vilas Research Professor and Irven DeVore Professor of Anthropology at the University of Wisconsin-Madison. With a Ph.D. in Anthropology from Harvard University, her current research is based in the Atlantic Forest of south-eastern Brazil, studying one of the world’s most endangered primates, the Northern muriqui. In June 2023, she will be celebrating 40 years of this continuous field study on the same population of this species. She is an international authority on the endangered northern muriqui monkey and her pioneering, long-term field research has been critical to conservation efforts on behalf of this species and has been influential in broadening comparative perspectives on primate behavioral and ecological diversity. Dr Strier served as the President of the International Primatological Society from 2016 to 2022. In 2005, she was elected to the National Academy of Science, USA and in 2010 she was awarded the Distinguished Primatologist award from the American Society of Primatology, to name just a small number of her many accolades. She is currently serving as an Associate Editor for Frontiers in Conservation Science, within the specialty section Animal Conservation. Photo credit: João Marcos Rosa What is the focus of your current research […]