Gender Gap in Science Meeting ICTP 4 -8 November 2019
Aim
The first aim of the meeting at ICTP is to report on the methodology, tools produced and results of the project and formulate recommendations and open questions based on its results. All talks will be informed by the results of the survey (Task 1), data analysis of publications (Task 2), and compilation of good practices (Task 3). The talks should not be speculative about what the gender gap is but refer to the results gathered and produced within the project. A second aim is to present the tools of our project and make itpossible for attendees to learn ow to use them and answer their own questions.
Program
Monday morning
9H-10H Welcome/presentation. Welcome video of co-director Mei-Hung Chiu.
Distribution of the preliminary version of the report, including recommendations.
10H-11H Report on Global Survey of Mathematical, Computing, and Natural Scientists. Rachel Ivie and/or Susan White
11H30-12H30 Report on Joint data-backed study on publication patterns. Helena Mihaljevic
Monday afternoon
13 H 30 15 H 30 Reimbursing at participants (at Main Building) and Poster Session (at Adriatico)
16 H 30- 18 H (Main Building Colloquium lecture “Molecular Motors and Switches at Surfaces” by Petra Rudolf, Zernike Institute for Advanced Materials, University of Groningen.
Abstract
Nano-engines and molecular motors form the basis of nearly every important biological process. In contrast to this solution chosen by Nature for achieving complex tasks, all of mankind’s present day technologies function exclusively through their static or equilibrium properties. On can therefore easily anticipate that the controlled movement of molecules or parts of molecules offers unprecedented technological possibilities for the future. In this presentation I shall illustrate how introducing new concepts like incorporating a ratchet mechanism, allows for the creation of molecular engines that transcend simple switches. I shall discuss how to build molecular engines that allow movements at the molecular level to be coupled to the macroscopic world, e.g., to
transport macroscopic objects like drops of liquid over a surface.
Another example are molecular systems that can be triggered to form spontaneously functional structures with a well-defined position on surfaces. I shall discuss molecular switches, which can be addressed with light and charge transfer and show that such systems can be employed for “read and write” functions.
Bibliographical sketch. Petra Rudolf was born in Munich, Germany. She studied Physics at the La Sapienza, University of Rome, where she specialized in Solid State Physics. In 1987 she joined the National Surface Science laboratory TASCINFM in Trieste for the following five years, interrupted by two extended periods in 1989 and 1990/1991 at Bell Labs in the USA, where she started to work on the newly discovered fullerenes. In 1993 she moved to the University of Namur, Belgium where she received her PhD in 1995 and then quickly moved from postdoctoral researcher to lecturer and senior lecturer before taking up the Chair in Experimental Solid State Physics at the University in Groningen in 2003. Her principal research interests lie in the areas of condensed matter physics and
surface science, particularly molecular motors, 2D solids, organic thin films and inorganic-organic hybrids. She has published 239 peer-reviewed articles and 26 book chapters. Dr. Rudolf is the President of the European Physical Society; she was the President of the Belgian Physical Society in 2000/2001 and was elected member of the German Academy of Science and Engineering, honorary member of the Italian Physical Society, Fellow of the Institute of Physics, “Lid van verdienst” of the Dutch Physical Society and Fellow of the American Physical Society. For her work on molecular motors she received the 2007 Descartes Prize of the European Commission. In 2013 she was appointed Officer of the Order of Orange Nassau by H.M. Queen Beatrix of the Netherlands.
Tuesday morning
– 9H-10H Report on Database of good practices for girls and young women, parents, and organizations, Merrilyn Goos
– 10H-10H 30What did we learn from the project about the gender gap in science in Asia, Africa, Latin America? Silvina Ponce-Dowson
– 10H 30-11H What did we learn from the project about the gender gap in science in developed/less developed countries? Marie Francoise Ouedraogo
– 11H30-12H30 What did we learn from the project about the gender gap for the various
disciplines? Lucia Santamaria
Tuesday afternoon
14 H 15H30 Discussions by discipline (discussion in little groups about the gender gap in a given discipline)
16H-18H World Cafe (discussion in little groups about various aspects of the recommendations of the project; preliminary version included in the documents we distributed at the beginning)
18H-19H Computer activities (introduction to using the tools from the project)
Tuesday evening
20H 30-22H 30 Film Hidden Figures
Hidden Figures is a 2016 American biographical drama film directed by Theodore Melfi and written by Melfi and Allison Schroeder. It is loosely based on the non-fiction book of the same name by Margot Lee Shetterly about black female mathematicians who worked at the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) during the Space Race. The film stars Taraji P. Henson as Katherine Johnson, a mathematician who calculated flight trajectories for Project Mercury and other missions. The film also features Octavia Spencer as NASA supervisor and mathematician Dorothy Vaughan and Janelle Monáe as NASA engineer Mary Jackson, with Kevin Costner, Kirsten Dunst, Jim Parsons, Glen Powell, and Mahershala Ali in supporting roles.
Wednesday morning
9H-10H Anathea Brooks, Recent Developments at UNESCO on Gender Equality
Summary: This talk will present i) an overview of the 2019 revision to UNESCO’s Gender
Equality Action Plan including UNESCO’s standing under the United Nations System-wide Action Plan for Mainstreaming Gender Equality and the Empowerment of Women (GEEW); ii) major projects and activities aimed at promoting GEEW undertaken by UNESCO in all its domains – education, the natural sciences (the main focus), the social and human sciences, culture, and communication and information – in line with the upcoming report, UNESCO and the Promise of Gender Equality, and iii) an update on the STEM and Gender Advancement (SAGA) project which ended in late 2018.
10H-11H Erika Coppola , Gender Equality activities at ICTP
11H30-12H30 Tracy Kay Camp, TBA
Wednesday afternoon
14H30-16H30 at SISSA (“cinema auditorium”). Round table on the gender gap in science in Europe and in North America starting with the topic” What did we learn about the gender gap in science in Europe and North America from the project?” Panelists: Silvana Badaloni, European Platform of Women Scientists, Jean-Pierre Bourguignon, European Research Council president, Katherine Clancy, representative of the National Science Academies from US and Jodi Tims, Association for Computing Machinery.
Reception, 7 th floor, 16H30-17H30 at SISSA
Thursday morning
9H-12H30 “group activities” in parallel: wikipedia pages for women with Camelia Boban or mini-projects using the tools of the project
Thursday afternoon:
12H 30 -15 H Lunch and Poster Session
15H-17H Presentation of the results of the group activities
17H-18H Synthesis of the World Cafe
Friday morning
9H-10H Guadalupe Lozano, Present and future: How individuals, policies, institutions, and culture shape the evolving gender gap in science
Summary: In this talk, we will consider examples of how current realities and behaviors at the micro- (individuals) and macro-levels (institutions, culture) may affect the eventual attainment (or not) of global gender equity in science. Illustrations will include stigma, beliefs, and usage surrounding parental leave policies, and the seemingly inverted gender gap in the service dimension of academic professorships in the United States.
10H-11H Catherine Jami, Some aspects of research on the gender gap in science by social scientists
11H30-12H30 Discussions by continent (discussion in little groups about reducing the gender gap in a given continent)
Friday afternoon
14H-15H30 What now? Recommendations of the project
15H30-16H Conclusions and closing remarks
Gender Gap in Science 