Issue of July 14, 2023
eds: Jeremy Bailin, Nicolle Zellner, Sethanne Howard, and Hannah Jang-Condell
[We hope you all are taking care of yourselves and each other. --eds.]
This week's issues:
1. Crosspost: An Astrobiologist’s Search for Life in Space—and Meaning on Earth
2. Points for discussion on institutional consequences for violating harassment policies
3. Science’s gender gap: the shocking data that reveal its true extent
4. The life of Nancy Grace Roman, the 'mother of Hubble'
5. New Lost Women of Science Podcast Mini-series Tells the Stories of the 'Forgotten' Women Who Worked on the Manhattan Project
6. How to Submit to the AASWOMEN newsletter
7. How to Subscribe or Unsubscribe to the AASWOMEN newsletter
8. Access to Past Issues
An online version of this newsletter will be available at http://womeninastronomy.blogspot.com/ at 3:00 PM ET every Friday.
By Ramin Skibba for Wired
When Aomawa Shields temporarily left astronomy in the 1990s for a life in the theater, no one knew whether planets existed beyond our solar system. By the time she returned to academia 11 years later, hundreds of exoplanets had been discovered. Today, telescopes and detection methods have advanced so much that the discoveries number close to 6,000.
Shields, now an astrobiologist at UC Irvine, studies these distant worlds using computer models to evaluate their climates and assess whether they might be friendly to alien life. During this second stint in academia, she completed her PhD at age 39 and afterward gave birth to her daughter. She has been named a 2015 TED Fellow, she’s the recipient of multiple grants and awards from NASA and the National Science Foundation, and she’s the founder and director of Rising Stargirls, a program encouraging girls of all colors to learn about the universe through theater, writing, and visual arts.
In her new book out today, Life on Other Planets, she discusses her scientific work, as well as her own experiences as one of the few Black women in physics and astronomy and as a classically trained actor who completed her master of fine arts degree at UCLA.
Read more at
http://womeninastronomy.blogspot.com/2023/07/crosspost-astrobiologists-search-for.html
Jill Tarter brings up an important point that the community and relevant agencies should consider regarding institutional roles in consequences for harassment:
"Have we made any progress in identifying and getting buy-in from an agency/authority that can enforce substantial consequences on those individuals who violate these new sexual harassment policies? Universities and research entities can shame-and-blame, but unless a next job or a fine is threatened – why should anyone stop? COSPAR, IAA, UNCOPUOS? In the US we are seeing cases brought to court for narrow rulings (usually by parents against school boards) -- not clear of the best way forward here."
Virginia Valian, psycholinguist at Hunter College in New York City, reviewed the book "Equity for Women in Science: Dismantling Systemic Barriers to Advancement' by Cassidy R. Sugimoto and Vincent Larivière (Harvard University Press). Valian writes that the authors, through data and vignettes, provide compelling evidence that bias against women is deeply ingrained.
Read the book review at
https://www.nature.com/articles/d41586-023-02139-x
By Ezzy Pearson
"Nancy Grace Roman not only laid the groundwork for our understanding of how galaxies grow but also founded NASA’s space astronomy programme, becoming ‘the mother of Hubble’. Roman’s love of the stars was evident from an early age, and she set up an astronomy club for her friends when she was just 10. However, when she told her guidance counsellor she wanted to be a professional astronomer, she was asked, "What lady would take mathematics instead of Latin?""
Read more at
https://www.skyatnightmagazine.com/space-science/nancy-grace-roman/
By PRNewswire
"The Lost Women of Science Initiative announced today a series of short podcast episodes about the women who played significant roles in the Manhattan Project – the effort during World War II to develop an atomic bomb. More than 640 women worked on the Manhattan Project, representing 11% of the workforce, but many of their contributions have largely been forgotten and unrecognized.
The series of six-minute biographies coincides with the release of the film Oppenheimer, and the NBC News documentary film, To End All War: Oppenheimer and the Atomic Bomb."
Read more at
Listen to the podcast at
https://www.lostwomenofscience.org/season-6-episodes/women-of-the-manhattan-project-trailer
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