The AAS Committee on the Status of Women in Astronomy maintains this blog to disseminate information relevant to astronomers who identify as women and share the perspectives of astronomers from varied backgrounds. If you have an idea for a blog post or topic, please submit a short pitch (less than 300 words).
The views expressed on this site are not necessarily the views of the CSWA, the AAS, its Board of Trustees, or its membership.
AAS Committee on the Status of WomenAAS Committee on the Status of Women Issue of May 28, 2021 eds: Heather Flewelling, Nicolle Zellner, Maria Patterson, Alessandra Aloisi, and Jeremy Bailin
[We hope you all are taking care of yourselves and each other. Be well! --eds.]
AAS Committee on the Status of WomenAAS Committee on the Status of Women Issue of May 21, 2021 eds: Heather Flewelling, Nicolle Zellner, Maria Patterson, Alessandra Aloisi, and Jeremy Bailin
[We hope you all are taking care of yourselves and each other. Be well! --eds.]
This post is part of our ongoing Women of Arecibo series, which highlights the achievements and experiences of women who built their careers around the 305-meter telescope at Arecibo Observatory, as well as the professional and personal impact of losing an instrument which was of utmost importance in their careers.
The following post features Dr. Tapasi Ghosh, who has been a Staff Scientist at the Green Bank Observatory since 2018. Previously, she worked as a Staff Astronomer at NAIC/Arecibo Observatory from 1992 - 2018. We asked her about her work with Arecibo and the impact of the facility.
How did you become a radio astronomer/work at Arecibo?
Dr. Ghosh on the platform of Arecibo in 2012
I was born and brought up in Kolkata India, and did my Masters in Physics from the University of Calcutta. Then, in 1983, I went to the Indian Institute of Science in Bangalore to join their "Joint Astronomy Program" for my graduate studies.
Astronomers for Planet Earth is a volunteer network that invites scientists, educators, and astronomy students to join in the effort against climate change and for climate justice. With more than 1000 members, this international organization of astronomers recently penned an open letter, published on Earth Day, in hopes of mobilizing support and building community around the common goal of sustainability. Below is an excerpt of the open letter.
An Open Letter to Astronomy Departments, Institutions and Societies: Adopt Sustainability as a Primary Goal
We, astronomers, astrophysicists, and global citizens, recognize the urgency of the climate crisis and our impact on it. We also recognize that we have the power to change our current practices. We call on astronomical institutions worldwide to set an example for the field in mitigating our contribution to climate change: naming sustainability as a primary goal, putting in place specific sustainable practices to lower carbon emissions, and clearly communicating these changes both to their own members and the general public.
Comprehensive scientific evidence clearly demonstrates that we are living in a climate emergency that calls for urgent action. Both the Paris agreement and the 2020 United Nations Emissions Gap Report outline the imperative to halt global heating and ocean acidification. Only through immediately effecting a significant and continuous reduction in global emissions can we achieve this goal. Without doing so, we will face both a biodiversity crisis through mass extinctions, and a humanitarian crisis from increasingly inhospitable living conditions. At our current rate of emissions--even despite the Covid pandemic--we are failing to prevent this disaster.
When LaNell Williams arrived at Harvard University in 2017 to begin a graduate program in physics, several of her peers told her she had been admitted only because she was a Black woman—her 3.9 GPA, NSF Graduate Research Fellowship, and two coauthored scientific papers notwithstanding. During an open house for the incoming class, she asked her fellow students why they thought no other underrepresented racial minority woman had been admitted to the physics department that year. “We [women of color] hear many different things in those conversations, one of them being that we’re not interested in physics, which isn’t true,” Williams says. “Or that some of us don’t have the pedigree, which is also not true. And then the last thing is that we don’t apply—and in some cases that is true.”
Photo courtesy of LaNell Williams
In Williams’s experience, however, many women of color had both the grades and the aptitude for physics, but they were discouraged from applying to graduate programs by their professors, advisers, and classmates. “I wanted to prove them wrong,” she says of her peers at Harvard. She was determined to show just how many talented candidates there really are. “I wanted to say to those women that you are as good as, if not better than, some of the people who might be applying to graduate school,” Williams explains.
AAS Committee on the Status of Women
Issue of May 07, 2021
eds: Heather Flewelling, Nicolle Zellner, Maria Patterson, Alessandra Aloisi, and Jeremy Bailin
[We hope you all are taking care of yourselves and each other. Be well! --eds.]
