Following the fantastic engagement with our previously published Women in AFM blog, we realised showcasing the AFM work of women was fundamental to the development of the AFM community.
The positive responses we received from many of you, including nominations for this blog, proved the need to continue the #WomenInAFM campaign. However, it has become evident to us how difficult it is to find women in AFM who identify as BIPOC, LGBT+ or from another underrepresented background.
This month we spoke with Dr Arzu Çolak, who shared her thoughts with us on why building a community of women in AFM is critical to the wider AFM community and the need for greater diversity and representation…
“Why did you want to get involved with this month’s Women in AFM campaign?
I have been in the AFM community for almost thirteen years since I started my PhD. Throughout this time, I have worked in institutions and research groups where the majority of group leaders or principal investigators (PIs) were men. Even today, if you look at the research groups studying AFM-related topics, you will see that they are mostly directed by men.
At conferences, I have rarely come across women group leaders and PIs from the AFM field. I do not believe that the problem is a lack of women leaders in the AFM field, but the absence of visibility or a platform for their voices.
In the first month’s blog of the Women in AFM campaign, there are some scientists whom I have never met or noticed before. Thanks to your campaign, I am now aware of them. This showed me that we need platforms to increase our visibility and share our research - thus NuNano’s campaign is a great opportunity for this.
Why do you believe it is important to see other women in AFM showcased?
To be able to increase the number of women scientists in the AFM field, it is important to increase the visibility of other women in AFM-related studies. They can be role models and give current women undergraduate and graduate students as well as postdocs courage and hope to be the future of AFM.
As I mentioned, during my own journey there was a lack of women AFM scientists showcased, so I was only aware of a limited number of women scientists in the field. This was discouraging and I felt alone most of the time. However, the more I saw other women in AFM showcased, the more I believed in being one of them in the future.
Having spoken with us about your experience of not personally knowing any BIPOC, LGBT+ or other underrepresented groups of women in AFM despite being in the area for 10+ years, what more do you think needs to be done to highlight a more diverse range of women?
I believe the absence of underrepresented groups of women in the AFM community is not a specific topic belonging to only our community. Women scientists, especially underrepresented group members, struggle in every field to get acceptance or find space.
I do think that the situation is developing in a positive way, especially since the younger generation is more open and fearless discussing their identities. I believe seeing and hearing other people from underrepresented groups triggers this courage. So, being united and supporting each other may help to find solutions or remove barriers.
Having worked in many different countries, it is also clear to me that every country approaches diversity and inclusion in different ways. Unfortunately, there are cultural issues which cannot be removed in a single day. For this reason, bringing together a more diverse range of women requires both a determined effort and patience.
How do you feel the Women in AFM community could grow?
Organizing specific conferences, panels, and webinars sponsored by AFM companies for women AFM scientists and students could help to grow participation in the AFM community. For instance, the American Physical Society (APS) organizes conferences for women undergraduate students in Physics (i.e., CUWIP) every year. If younger generations have greater chances of seeing women speakers in such conferences, panels, and webinars they might be encouraged to stay in the AFM field.
We also need the support of the men in the AFM community. I know that some men scientists in other fields do not attend or accept to be participants or speakers of conferences if there are no women speakers. We need such support in our field as well. As research group leaders in academia, it is also our responsibility to give more chances to women students starting from undergraduate research.”
Dr Arzu Çolak, Clarkson University, USA
Due to the popularity of our campaign, we have extended our list from 10 to 12 Women in AFM! Below we feature 12 women using AFM, all at different stages in their careers and researching varied topics ranging from characterising corrosion events to studying light harvesting complex II (LHCII) clusters. Click the images below to read about each researcher’s work and their career.
If you know of any women in AFM (particularly from underrepresented backgrounds) that you would like to nominate for our future #WomenInAFM campaigns, please get in contact with us at community@nunano.com or fill in the form below. We are especially keen to build the #WomenInAFM community beyond our blog posts, so we also welcome any suggestions regarding this!
Alongside this we highly encourage any women in AFM reading this blog post, or readers who know of fellow women in AFM, to submit their profile to the RMS gender equality database spearheaded by Dr Siân Culley.
Weill Cornell Medicine, United States of America