Women in science, in Madrid Italian female researchers as testimonials – News from Embassies

Licia Verde embraced cosmology driven by questions such as “Where did the universe come from?”. Alessandra Gorla discovered computing from the overwhelming need to really understand how her first computer worked. Laura Formentini had a precise dream as a child: ‘to become a witch and prepare magic potions’. Today, for all three of them, science is first and foremost a job, as well as a great passion. Having become established researchers, they have developed prestigious international careers and currently carry out their professional activities in Spain.

   
Precisely because of their experiences, the Italian Embassy in Madrid chose them as testimonials for a special anniversary: the International Day of Women and Girls in Science, officially held on 11 February and celebrated in the Iberian capital last night with an event entitled ‘Science = noun, singular, feminine’ and hosted by the Italian Cultural Institute (IIC).

   
During the evening, the three guest researchers talked about different aspects of their activities, highlighting similarities and differences in their respective fields: Formentini as a biochemist at the Centro Severo Ochoa in Madrid and lecturer at the Autonomous University of Madrid, Gorla as a computer scientist and professor at the Imdea Software institute in Madrid, and Verde as a professor at the Institute of Cosmos Sciences in Barcelona. And all three agreed on the need to have female reference points in their daily lives. ‘Our true role models are the women who do science every day with us,’ said Formentini, for example.

   
The debate, moderated by the scientific attaché of the Italian embassy, Sergio Scopetta, was also attended by the ambassador to Madrid, Giuseppe Buccino Grimaldi. “A consistent female presence in the enabling professions of new technologies can no longer be postponed,” he said, adding that this is necessary both to “overcome gender barriers due to obsolete cultural conventions” and to “recover our countries’ economic competitiveness”. At the end of the evening, a special moment for Paola Bovolenta, director of the Centro de Biología Molecular Severo Ochoa in Madrid: the neurobiologist was decorated with the Order of the Star of Italy in the rank of Knight.

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