London, 2 July 2012
FEMALE SCIENTISTS AWARDED TOP PRIZE
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Recipients of the UK & Ireland L’Oréal UNESCO For Women in Science Awards announced
Winners from London, Belfast, Dublin and Cambridge scoop £15,000 each to fund their research
careers
The winners of the prestigious 2012 L’Oréal-UNESCO UK & Ireland For Women In Science Fellowships (FWIS)
were announced last night at a glittering ceremony at London’s Royal Society.
The four outstanding female scientists, who are all working on postdoctoral studies, were each awarded
fellowships of £15,000 to spend on whatever they may need to continue their research, from buying scientific
equipment to paying for childcare or travel.
They were selected by a jury of eminent scientists, chaired by Professor Dame Athene Donald (DBE, FRS),
Professor of Physics and Gender Equality Champion at the University of Cambridge and FWIS Laureate.
The 2012 winners are:
Dr Silvia Giordani, from Trinity College Dublin, for her work on a new avenue towards
“smart” medicines (Chemistry)
This research project is geared towards the synthesis, characterization and application of new
nanoparticles that carry several key functions in one construct, thereby making them suitable as smart
and responsive therapeutic vehicles. Combining biological systems and new nanomaterials may allow us
to improve methods for disease diagnosis, treatment, monitoring and control. Each nanoparticle can
essentially be viewed as a targeted delivery system, with the ultimate aim of producing a system capable
of direct “communication” between diagnostic, imaging and therapeutic functions located on a single
biocompatible platform.
Dr Katrina Lythgoe, from Imperial College London, for her work in multiscale evolutionary
dynamics of important human diseases (Evolutionary Epidemiology)
We urgently need to understand how pathogens are likely to evolve under different intervention
strategies before they are widely implemented, but for this we need appropriate mathematical models.
Because pathogens are typically subject to conflicting selection pressures it is important to simultaneously
model selection within individuals and at transmission. Although many pathogen strains are typically
present in an infected individual, existing models do not account for this, even though this is likely to have
a dramatic impact on predictions. The aim is to develop a modelling framework that concurrently follows
up to 100 strains during each infection together with transmission at the population level which will be
applied to HIV and malaria while also informing the design of intervention strategies for these diseases.
Dr Claire Spottiswoode, from the University of Cambridge, for her work on the genetics of
cuckoo egg mimicry: solving a century-old evolutionary puzzle (Evolutionary Biology)
I am in interested in the genetic underpinnings of coevolution, the process by which two or more species
reciprocally influence one another’s evolution. I study brood parasitic birds, such as cuckoos, which are
cheats that lay their eggs in other birds' nests. Cuckoos and other brood parasites lay eggs that beautifully
mimic those of their chosen host, to trick host parents into accepting the parasitic egg as one of their
own. This research project will attempt to solve a century-old evolutionary puzzle: how do individual
females of the same brood parasitic species lay eggs that mimic those of their specialist host, despite
interbreeding with males raised by other hosts? I hope to locate the genes involved in mimicry of
different host species, by exploiting powerful new genomic methods in combination with breeding
experiments on captive Cuckoo Finches that I study in Zambia.
Dr Geetha Srinivasan, from Queen’s University Belfast, for her work on ionic liquids enabling
biomedical applications (Chemistry)
The aim of this research is to produce an advanced method of drug delivery directly to the site of
infection, eliminating the conventional route of drug administration orally in which the drug often loses
efficacy before it reaches the site of infection due to metabolism in the gastro-intestinal track. An
electronic probe loaded with the necessary drug in the right quantity could be introduced through a
catheter into the body. When an external electric potential/current is applied to this probe, the drug in
the probe will be delivered into the body fluid. I will use conducting polymers as the probe in the catheter
and ionic liquids as a solvent medium to load the water insoluble drugs into the polymers. Conducting
polymers are known as intelligent materials with the unique behaviour of trapping an ion into their
structure and release the ion by an electric potential. This property will be used to load and release the
drug, making treatment instantaneous and effective.
Chair of the jury Professor Donald said: “These awards are always a joy to judge. We had an outstanding
shortlist of eight bright young women who care deeply about their areas of study. This made selecting the
winners an incredibly tough task, but it also showed the extraordinary range of scientific research being carried
out by female scientists in the UK and Ireland.
“I am delighted that the scientific community in UK and Ireland is waking up to the fact that we have to provide
men and women with a level playing field in scientific study, allowing us judges the privilege of making our
selection from such a fantastic shortlist.
“I am confident that the four winners – Dr Silvia Giordani, Dr Katrina Lythgoe, Dr Claire Spottiswoode and Dr
Geetha Srinivasan, are worthy recipients of the prize money, as well as the prestige that comes with winning this
award. I look forward to seeing them flourish in coming months and years and become fantastic ambassadors
for women in science.
“Around the world so many women still believe that combining families and a serious science career cannot be
done, despite many successful female scientists having done just this. My colleagues and I work tirelessly to get
the message across that this combination is not impossible.”
“Slowly but surely we are seeing a shift in the underrepresentation of women in science in the UK and Ireland. A
seminal moment occurred last summer when the Chief Medical Officer Dame Sally Davies indicated her intention
that all medical schools who wish to apply for NIHR Biomedical Research Centres and Units funding need to have
achieved the benchmark of an Athena SWAN Charter for women in science Silver Award.”
“This strong message from a key funder, with indications that other funders are thinking of following suit, is
focusing universities to confront the problem for women in their workforce.
“The L’Oréal-UNSECO For Women in Science Awards celebrate and support female scientists and I am delighted
to have chaired the jury this year. I look forward to seeing how these outstanding scientists flourish in coming
months and years.”
The fellowships, now in their fourteenth year internationally and sixth year in the UK, promote the importance
of ensuring greater participation of women in science by offering awards to outstanding female postdoctoral
researchers. The UK fellowships have been designed to provide flexible financial help for the winners to
undertake research in their chosen fields.
The awards are run in partnership with the UK National Commission for UNESCO, the Irish National Commission
for UNESCO and the Royal Society.
ENDS
Notes to Editors
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Winners photographs are available upon request
Interviews with winners are available upon request
Dame Professor Athene Donald and Julie McManus, Head of Scientific, L’Oréal UK & Ireland, are
available for select interviews
For more information please contact:
Katy Gandon
Email: KGandon@uk.loreal.com
Tel: 0208 762 4136
Abbi Broadbent / Helen Prowse
Email: abbi.broadbent@diffusionpr.com / helen.prowse@diffusionpr.com
Tel: 0207 291 0230
L’ORÉAL-UNESCO FOR WOMEN IN SCIENCE BACKGROUND
The L’Oréal –UNESCO For Women In Science International Programme was founded fourteen years ago by
L’Oréal and UNESCO on the premise that ‘the world needs science and science needs women’. The awards
programme is designed to promote and highlight the critical importance of ensuring greater participation of
women in science, by awarding promising female scientists with fellowships to help them further their research.
There are three distinct schemes:
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1.0 The International Laureate Programme: The founding awards provide five leading female scientists,
one from each continent, every year with a prestigious laureate of $100,000 in recognition of their
groundbreaking achievements and contributions to scientific progress. These women are at the cutting
edge of their research fields. The international structure of the programme ensures that the laureates
are distributed among women who are working under a wide variety of conditions. 72 laureates have
been given since this programme’s creation.
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2.0 The International Fellowships: These fellowships help young women scientists from around the world
take up research positions in other countries, allowing them to pursue their research in some of the
world’s most prestigious laboratories. There are 15 fellowships given out each year to support ‘the faces
of science for tomorrow’.
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3.0 The National Fellowships, such as the UK & Ireland programme, are run in over 46 countries around
the world. Each National Fellowship helps women scientists at a critical point in their career to continue
to pursue their research with flexible financial aide.
THE L’ORÉAL UK AND IRELAND NATIONAL FELLOWSHIPS
The L’Oréal UK and Ireland Fellowships For Women In Science were launched in January 2007. The Fellowships
are run in partnership with the UK National Commission for UNESCO, the Irish National Committee for UNESCO
and the Royal Society of Great Britain.
This year, 4 awards of £15,000 will be offered to outstanding female postdoctoral researchers.
The fellowships have been designed to provide practical help for the winners to continue in their chosen fields.
For example, winners may choose to spend their fellowship on buying scientific equipment or paying for
childcare costs or indeed whatever they may need to continue their research.
In total, over 1,200 women in 103 countries have been recognised for their research and received funding to
further their studies since the overall programme was founded in 1998