Half a million dollars for top women scientists

This year’s laureates of the L’ORÉAL–UNESCO Awards For Women in Science were fêted at UNESCO in Paris on 22 February, where each received a cheque for US$100,000. The previous day, 15 promising young women working in the life sciences on each continent had been awarded research scholarships worth up to US$40,000 each.

The laureate for Africa, Prof. Ameenah Gurib–Fakim, is Professor of Organic Chemistry and Pro-Vice-Chancellor at the University of Mauritius. She made the first-ever full inventory of the medicinal and aromatic plants on Mauritius and neighboring Rodriguez Island. Prof. Gurib-Fakim and her team have also studied a bitter melon (Momordica charantia) and other medicinal plants which act as starch blockers, slowing the release of free glucose into the bloodstream, for their potential in treating diabetes (mellitus). Prof. Gurib-Fakim is a founding member of the Association for African Medicinal Plants Standards, which aims to bring plant remedies that meet international norms to the world market.

The laureate for Asia–Pacific, Prof. Margaret Brimble, is Chair of Organic and Medicinal Chemistry at the University of Auckland (New Zealand). She makes and modifies complex, rare bioactive compounds derived from plants, animal tissues, microbes or marine and salt organisms that exhibit antimicrobial, anticancer or antiviral activity. She has worked extensively on synthesizing shellfish toxins.

The laureate for Europe, Prof. Tatiana Birshtein from the Institute of Macromolecular Compounds at the Russian Academy of Sciences, focuses on the statistical physics of polymers (see p.5). Her work has shed new light on the self-organizing properties of many remarkable polymeric systems. Among her contributions: the study of the degree to which macromolecules “stick” on surfaces and the ways in which their structures shift in response to their surrounding environments.

The laureate for Latin America, Prof. Ligia Gargallo from the Department of Physical Chemistry at the Pontifical Catholic University of Chile, has set out to demonstrate that polymer behavior in different states (solid, liquid and interface) is determined by the flexibility of the polymer chain and whether its component monomers (a series of repeating subunits) seek out or avoid water. A better understanding of the ways in which these subunits interact should help researchers to develop applications in technology, medicine and so on.

The laureate for North America, Prof. Mildred Dresselhaus, is Institute Professor of Electrical Engineering and Physics at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Her paper of 1991 showed that a carbon nanotube can behave as either a metal or semi-conductor, depending on its geometry (see p.2). Her insights were later confirmed experimentally. Prof. Dresselhaus has described her work as taking a “bottom-up approach”, in which she develops new nanoscale systems, characterizes their properties then sees what they can be used for.

For details: www.forwomeninscience.com; r.clair@unesco.org