Feb. 10 – Two Italian researchers – Tiziana Sgroi of National Institute of Geophysics and Volcanology (INGV) and Sara Pensierie of the Institute of Intelligent Systems for Automation of the National Research Council, CNR-Issia – have been selected by Oceanography to be part of the 200 autobiographical sketches of women scientists in the field of oceanography. The journal recently published the content in a special volume entitled “Women in Oceanography – a Decade Later”. The INGV researcher commented: “It gives me immense professional and personal satisfaction.” Sgroi received this “award” thanks to her research activity in the sea, dedicated to the study of crustal systems both tectonic and volcanic in nature is c, through the correlation between seismic, geophysical and oceanographic data. “Being one of the two Italians invited to participate in this initiative – continues Sgroi – filled me with pride, especially for the implications it brings in terms of recognition for the activity in a field that, in general, in Italy is not yet well established and supported.” The researcher was invited to present her autobiography after publishing in the same journal, the article “Geohazards in the Western Ionian Sea. Insights from Non-Earthquake Signals Recorded by the NEMO-SN1 Seafloor Observatory”, in which she showed possible sources of instability in the bottom of the Ionian Sea, through the analysis of seismic data not associated with earthquakes. “The reasons that led to repeat this initiative, 10 years after the first volume (Women in Oceanography, published in March 2005, ed) are quite understandable – continues Sgroi – Gender equality in the world of research is a goal far from being achieved. In the initial part of the volume, a series of articles show the low percentages of women published in research. In the US, statistics on employment and career opportunities in the academic world of women scientists who deal with oceanography give values around 30% in the case of Assistant Professors, and below 20% for Full / Senior Professors. In addition, data on women’s participation in oceanographic missions of the Ocean Drilling Program (ODP), an international cooperation initiative created to explore and study the composition and structure of the ocean basins, is around 30%. In both cases, in Europe the percentages are lower, such as in ODP campaigns in which female participation is less than 10%.” Ellen Kappel, editor of the magazine, selected the scientists based on three criteria: the submission of scientific papers to Oceanography as first authors; participation in conferences as invited speakers or discussion leaders; and the AGU Fellows certification. “This publication – concludes Sgroi – allowed me to explain in a simple way the multidisciplinary activities of the research I do, as well as the motivations and challenges that I face every day.”
