Women Achieving Recognition in
Science
Compiled by Diana Temple
• PROFESSOR HELEN GARNETT has been appointed Vice-Chancellor of the Northern Territory University, which will amalgamate with the Centralian College to become the new Charles Darwin University. She has been for many years the chief of ANSTO (Australian Nuclear Science and Technology Organisation). There she organised the establishment of the new $300 million reactor being built at Lucas Heights. She is an Emeritus Professor of Biology from the University of Wollongong.
Source : Lab
News Aug-Sept 2003
• Two distinguished Australian women biologists are to head the new Centre for the Kangaroo Genome, funded by the Australian Research Council. They are PROFESSOR JENNY GRAVES of the Research School of Biological Sciences at ANU and PROFESSOR MARILYN RENFREE at the University of Melbourne, together with Professor Des Cooper of Macquarie University. The genetic map of the Tammar wallaby is to be their first aim.
Source: Lab
News Aug-Sept 2003
• An interdisciplinary group of researchers including ASSOC. PROFESSOR LEA WILLIAMS, Director of the Brain Dynamics Centre at Westmead Hospital, has won the inaugural Eureka Prize for interdisciplinary scientific research, sponsored by the Royal Societies of Australia. The team, which also includes Professor Peter Robinson of Physics at Sydney University, Dr Chris Rennie, a Westmead Hospital physicist and Evian Gordon, senior lecturer in Psychological Medicine, studies brain functions by means of electroencephalograms and magnetic resonance imaging.
Source:
Uninews (University of Sydney), 22 Aug 2003
• Women from the Monash Institute of Reproduction and Development are recipients of recent awards: DR KATE LOVELAND, a WISENET member, has received the 2003 young andrologist award from the American Society of Andrology for her work on the production and development of sperm from stem cells; DR RENAE JARRAD, of the same institute, has received a grant of $98,000 from the US Army Department of Defence for continuing research on prostate cancer.
Source:
Monash Institutes of Health News, 2003
• EUROPEAN WOMEN SCIENTISTS: PROFESSOR SUSAN GIBSON of King’s College London, who is described as a synthetic chemist, won the inaugural Royal Society Rosalind Franklin Award, which helps promote women in science. The award is open to both sexes. WOMEN IN INDUSTRIAL RESEARCH- A WAKE-UP CALL is a report from the European Commission alerting industry to the low proportion of women, about 15%, working in industrial research in Europe. Governments should encourage companies to provide support structures for parents, to help unleash the potential of women in research. There is probably less research done by companies in Australia - it would be interesting to know the percentage of women employed in industrial research in this country.
Source:
Chemistry in Britain, May 2003
• Britain has initiated a £1.5 million scheme to encourage women graduates in SET (science, engineering and technology) to return to science after career breaks. This resulted from a report, SET far, by BARONESS SUSAN GREENFIELD. Trade and Industry Secretary Patricia Hewitt said of the project: “it is vital for the success of our economy that we make the most of our female scientists”.
Source: Chemistry in Britain, June 2003.