LifeWatch Belgium initiative, WoRMS, partners with International Seabed Authority to support UN Ocean Decade

WoRMS ISA

The collaboration between ISA, the International Seabed Authority, and WoRMS (the World Register of Marine Species, which is hosted by VLIZ, the focal point of LifeWatch Belgium) will reinforce the quality of deep-sea taxonomic information and data contained in the ISA DeepData database, in support of United Nations Decade of Ocean Science for Sustainable Development.


A fundamental element of the mandate assigned to ISA by UNCLOS, the United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea, is to disseminate the results of all research undertaken through open and transparent data and information sharing. ISA also organises access to non-confidential information and data, in particular data relating to the marine environment. It is in this context that ISA and WoRMS have agreed to cooperate, with a view to make use of the comparative advantage of their respective information systems, thanks to periodic scientific reviews between DeepData and WoRMS’ thematic subregister, the World Register of Deep-Sea Species (WoRDSS).

ISA and WoRMS will also work together to provide training for ISA data providers and users of taxonomic data, and enable the development of innovative taxonomic tools with a view to standardising data exchange protocols and promoting the use of biodiversity information for scientific research in the international seabed area. This partnership will also contribute to LifeWatch ERIC, specifically through the LifeWatch Species Information Backbone, which aims to bring together taxonomic and species-related data and to fill knowledge gaps, and is the driving force behind the species information services of the Belgian LifeWatch.be e-Lab.

WoRMS has been endorsed as an Ocean Decade project, and will continue to build on its expertise to support global efforts towards enhanced understanding of taxonomic information of all marine life in support of scientific research, policy making and increased general public knowledge.


This story was adapted from a post on LifeWatch Belgium.
[image provided by the International Seabed Authority, credits: (c) Gilles Martin / IFREMER]

A Window on Science

Podcasts

LifeWatch ERIC, the European e-Science Infrastructure for Biodiversity and Ecosystem Research, is launching a new podcast series. Entitled “LifeWatch ERIC: A Window on Science”, the fortnightly 10-minute broadcast is geared towards the widest possible audience, from researchers to informaticians, and from politicians to ordinary people concerned about climate change and the environment. 

Starting on 16 March 2022, the early episodes will focus on the Internal Joint Initiative, LifeWatch ERIC’s core activity in its first five years: the development of a new, innovative Virtual Research Environment focused on Non-indigenous and Invasive Species. And if that sounds complicated to you, perhaps you would do well to tune into the first few podcasts, designed to demystify some of that science-speak.

As Christos Arvanitidis, CEO of LifeWatch ERIC commented, “The podcasts are offered as an easy-to-digest communication to raise awareness of our work beyond the scientistic communities already involved. We’re hoping they will have a great impact and attract more users to our next-gen Big Data management facilities”.

The Window on Science podcasts are available on our website and on all major podcast platforms:

Series One. Introducing the Internal Joint Initiative:

16 March Trailer

30 March LifeWatch ERIC Chief Executive Officer, Christos Arvanitidis

12 April    Alberto Basset, Director of the LifeWatch ERIC Service Centre, Lecce

27 April    LifeWatch ERIC Chief Technology Officer, Juan Miguel González-Aranda

Stay tuned, more details on Seasons Two and Three coming up soon!

LifeWatch ERIC Delegation Visit to Dublin

LifeWatch ERIC Dublin

In early March, LifeWatch ERIC CEO, Christos Arvanitidis, and CTO, Juan Miguel González-Aranda, travelled to Ireland to attend several meetings organised in collaboration with University College Dublin (UCD) and Intelligence in Science (ISC).

The goal was to strengthen ties and to collaborate on enhancing the knowledge and conservation of biodiversity and ecosystems in Ireland, which was the topic of several meetings from 2 – 4 March 2022. As well as having the honour of speaking with members of the Irish parliament and ministry, and representatives from the Embassies of Spain and South Africa, the LifeWatch ERIC delegation held bilateral and group meetings with research centres hosted by two of Ireland’s principal universities, as well as other Irish state agencies, universities and private organisations working in this vital research sector.

The delegation was encouraged by the positive experience, and left satisfied that large steps forward had been made to bring these various communities together to fortify collaboration across biodiversity and ecosystem research.

Full itinerary:

Wednesday, 2 March

On their first day, the CEO and CTO had fruitful discussions with Jeremy Gault of MAREI SFI Research Centre for Energy, Climate and Marine Research and Innovation from University College Cork (UCC), Triona McCormack, Director of Research at UCD; and Michael Ryan, Irish National Delegate to the European Strategy Forum on Research Infrastructures (ESFRI).

Thursday, 3 March

Thursday was a busy workday. At UCD’s Belfield Campus the LifeWatch ERIC delegation met with the UCD Research Leadership team: Orla Feely, Vice-President for Research Innovation and Impact, Triona McCormack – Director of Research, and Ciara Leonard, Public Affairs Manager.

This was followed by a seminar with UCD researchers, hosted by the SFI Research Centre in Applied Geosciences (iCRAG), with: Murray Hitzman, iCRAG Director,  Jennifer Craig, iCRAG COO, Aoife Brady, iCRAG’s Industry and Research Programme Manager, Francesca Martini, iCRAG’s Senior Grants Manager, Maeve Boland, iCRAG’sGeoscience Policy, Communications, and Public Affairs Specialist, Dr Aoife Blowick, iCRAG’s Operations Manager, ISC’s Declan Kirrane, and Ciara Leonard.

The delegation then travelled to the Ministry in Dublin, where they were honoured with a meeting with Damien English, Minister of State at the Department of Enterprise, Trade and Employment.

A seminar followed, held with Daan du Toit from the Department of Science and Innovation of South Africa, joined by Murray Hitzman, Jennifer Craig, Maeve Boland, David Khoza from Integrated Geoscience Development, Declan Kirrane and Ciara Leonard.

To end the day, LifeWatch ERIC hosted a dinner at the Conrad Hotel, attended by many of the day’s meeting participants, such as Ciara Leonard, Maeve Boland, Murray Hitzman, Jennifer Craig and Declan Kirrane, as well as Samuel Browett from the Waterford Institute of Technology, Willem Geerlings from the Embassy of South Africa and Eduardo Sánchez Moreno from the Embassy of Spain.

Friday, 4 March

The last day of meetings were held with Kevin Burke, National Director for Horizon Europe at Enterprise, Ireland, Peter Heffernan from the Marine Institute and Mission Board, and Ian Jones, founder and CEO of Innopharma Group.

Wrapping up the week at the Dail Eireann (Irish parliament), Christos Arvanitidis and Juan Miguel González-Aranda were honoured to meet Jim O’Callaghan, TD (Member of Parliament) for Dublin Bay South.

Statement from Africa Zanella, Gender & Sustainability Expert, for International Women’s Day on behalf of LifeWatch ERIC

International Womens Day 2022

“I have been profoundly moved learning about the fantastic scientists put in the spotlight for International Women’s Day 2022. While their stories read in isolation are inspiring, it is particularly poignant to read them together, and realise that while this diverse group of women speak different mother tongues, hail from different time periods and harbour different interests, they all shared the same vision to improve the world through science, and broke the barriers put in front of them to arrive at that goal. From Marie-Anne Libert, who was not entitled to receive formal scientific training, yet went on to describe more than 200 novel taxa, to Angela Piskernik, who became the first Slovenian female doctor of biological sciences, to Emilia Chiancone, the first woman President of the Italian National Academy of Sciences, to Rita Covas, Montserrat Vilà, Tatyana Bileva, Despoina Vokou and Martina Vijver, the brilliant scientists who are powering research in Europe today.

Individually, their work has had a huge impact on their respective research fields, but together, they have profoundly influenced society as a whole, from our cultural beliefs to the economic landscape, by paving the way for future women scientists to overcome established patterns, stereotyping and unconscious bias and help to maintain a female presence in these traditionally male-dominated fields. LifeWatch ERIC has sought on the special occasion of International Women’s Day 2022 to encourage more women to pursue a career in STEM – to seek roles as researchers, investigators, thought leaders, to assist with the many issues facing our planet and our society at this point of time and ensure sustainability for the future.

By recently creating the role of Gender Equity Officer, LifeWatch ERIC is going further to actively integrate a gender dimension in Research and Innovation, and a more gender-balanced approach to its work, in fostering equality in scientific careers, and diversity and inclusion in line with European Commission guidelines as well as the UN SDGs and campaigns (Gender Equality Today for a Sustainable Tomorrow). As women, we too have an important role to play in science, progress and well-being, as demonstrated by the women described above. It is my job and pleasure to work with the LifeWatch ERIC team to design and implement a Gender Equality Plan, to create an equitable  and sustainable culture  for all talent at work, and to further the Infrastructure’s quest to develop innovative research tools and systems for biodiversity and ecosystem scientists everywhere. 

From all at Lifewatch ERIC, we wish you a very Happy International Women’s Day 2022.”

International Women’s Day 2022: Martina Vijver

Martina Vijver

For International Women’s Day 2022, we at LifeWatch ERIC are putting eight scientists in the spotlight. Each of the LifeWatch ERIC member states has proposed a figure who has broken boundaries over the course of her lifetime, and is an inspiration to younger generations looking to pursue a career in STEM.

As we explored in the podcast we recorded for The International Day of Women and Girls in Science, women are still underrepresented in various scientific fields, such as engineering, computer science and AI. Additionally, scientific research in general is not only unbalanced in terms of composition (33% female) but also in terms of hierarchy, with only 12% of national science academy members being women, who are disproportionately overlooked when it comes to promotion and grants.

The women at the centre of our campaign are very diverse, hailing from a range of countries and time periods, but they all have one thing in common: overcoming the odds in order to contribute to scientific improvement. We want to draw attention to just a fraction of the women who have defied the cultural barriers pitted against them to bring good to the world, and bring recognition where they might have been overlooked. 

Martina Vijver is a Professor of Ecotoxicology at Leiden University, where she leads the research line “Chemical stressors and impacts on biodiversity”. She is also Chair of the University’s Permanent Committee for Academic Practice (WeCo) as well as the cofounder and director of the Researchers in Science for Equality network (RISE) and founder of the Living Lab.

Previously, Vijver was a modeller and scientific researcher at the Dutch National Institute for Public Health and the Environment (RIVM), gaining her PhD in Ecotoxicology (bioaccumulation) at the Vrije Universiteit Amsterdam before joining the Institute of Environmental Sciences at the University of Leiden in 2005. Now she investigates different stressors on biodiversity like chemicals, nanomaterials, electromagnetic fields or light, and is author of 110< peer-reviewed scientific articles. She is particularly passionate about fieldwork, believing in the value of carrying out ecotoxicology research under natural conditions, leading her to found the Living Lab at the University of Leiden in 2016, where she is the principal investigator. The Living Lab is an outdoor facility where professors and students of the University’s Institute of Enviromental Sciences can research the effects of mankind on the environment in the most realistic way possible.

She has been involved  in several different EU–FP7 and Horizon 2020 projects, like PATROLS, and is actively engaged in scientific outreach activities such as speaking in public lectures and giving tours to schoolchildren. In addition, she co-founded and directs RISE, whose mission is to support female scientists by stimulating their personal and professional development, advancing their careers and enhancing their visibility. The network also aims to raise awareness of the importance of gender equality amongst scientific staff “by providing solicited and unsolicited advice to the Faculty Board and Selection and Appointment Committees”. In 2017, she received a World Cultural Council Special Recognition Award for research with an impact on society.

International Women’s Day 2022: Angela Piskernik

Angela Piskernik

For International Women’s Day 2022, we at LifeWatch ERIC are putting eight scientists in the spotlight. Each of the LifeWatch ERIC member states has proposed a figure who has broken boundaries over the course of her lifetime, and is an inspiration to younger generations looking to pursue a career in STEM.

As we explored in the podcast we recorded for The International Day of Women and Girls in Science, women are still underrepresented in various scientific fields, such as engineering, computer science and AI. Additionally, scientific research in general is not only unbalanced in terms of composition (33% female) but also in terms of hierarchy, with only 12% of national science academy members being women, who are disproportionately overlooked when it comes to promotion and grants.

The women at the centre of our campaign are very diverse, hailing from a range of countries and time periods, but they all have one thing in common: overcoming the odds in order to contribute to scientific improvement. We want to draw attention to just a fraction of the women who have defied the cultural barriers pitted against them to bring good to the world, and bring recognition where they might have been overlooked. 

Angela Piskernik, born in 1886, was a botanist, the first Slovenian conservationist and the first Slovenian woman to receive a doctorate in biological sciences. She was internationally renowned for her conservationist work, responsible for the establishment of the Triglav National Park, amongst many more feats.

She studied at the University of Vienna, specialising in biological systematics and graduating with a dissertation entitled “Plasma compounds in mosses”. She went on to teach in secondary schools from 1926 to 1943, when she was imprisoned for two years in the Ravensbrück Nazi concentration camp. Afterwards, she became director of the Natural History Museum in Ljubljana, where she worked until she retired in 1953. Her retirement, however, marked the beginning of some of her most famous work – becoming the first professional nature conservation officer, noted for her involvement in the restoration and protection of the Julian Alpine Botanical Garden in Trenta and the establishment of the Triglav National Park in 1961. Her lasting achievements as a nature conservation officer also included preparations for the legal protection of several other landscape parks, initiating the protection of the first nature reserves in Slovenia.

In addition, Piskernik proposed the establishment of a mountain guard in 1954, was active in the International Alpine Commission and edited the journal ‘Nature Protection’. She was part of the Slovenian Natural History Society and Association of Society for the Protection of Birds, as well as several international nature conservation associations such as IUCN and VNP. For her long and active involvement in this organisation, she was made an honorary member of the International Commission for the Protection of Alpine Regions (CIPRA) after her death in 1967. Over her lifetime, she published 42 scientific papers on nature conservation. She received the Van Tienhoven International Award for her work, as well as an award from the Friderich-Wilhelm University in Bonn.

Other special honours include the naming of a prize after her by the Natural History Society of Slovenia, which is given to individuals who have shown outstanding services to the protection of natural heritage, as well as the issue of a commemorative stamp with her image in 2019.

International Women’s Day 2022: Montserrat Vilà

Montserrat Vilà

For International Women’s Day 2022, we at LifeWatch ERIC are putting eight scientists in the spotlight. Each of the LifeWatch ERIC member states has proposed a figure who has broken boundaries over the course of her lifetime, and is an inspiration to younger generations looking to pursue a career in STEM.

As we explored in the podcast we recorded for The International Day of Women and Girls in Science, women are still underrepresented in various scientific fields, such as engineering, computer science and AI. Additionally, scientific research in general is not only unbalanced in terms of composition (33% female) but also in terms of hierarchy, with only 12% of national science academy members being women, who are disproportionately overlooked when it comes to promotion and grants.

The women at the centre of our campaign are very diverse, hailing from a range of countries and time periods, but they all have one thing in common: overcoming the odds in order to contribute to scientific improvement. We want to draw attention to just a fraction of the women who have defied the cultural barriers pitted against them to bring good to the world, and bring recognition where they might have been overlooked. 

Montserrat Vilà Planella, born in Figueres (Girona), is a research professor at the Doñana Biological Station (EBD-CSIC). She carried out a PhD in Biology from the Autonomous University of Barcelona, where she was a lecturer in Ecology and scientific secretary of CREAF, followed by a post-doctorate at the University of California at Berkeley. Her research work mainly focuses on the ecology of biological invasions and their application to ecosystem conservation, for which she was given the most prestigious award in Spain in the field of scientific research, and with which she and her team have developed Impact Risk Assessments for major invaders in Europe.

Vilà is a member of the IUCN Invasive Species Specialist Group, chair of NEOBIOTA, and member of the Scientific Forum on the European Regulation of Invasive Alien Species. With more than 200 publications in SCI scientific journals and more than 40 book chapters, in the last 8 years she has been highlighted by Thomson-Reuters as among the top 1% of the world’s most cited researchers in the field of Ecology and Environment. She is associate editor of the journals Biological Invasions, NeoBiota, Ecology Letters and Bioscience, serving on several project evaluation panels. She was previously deputy director at EBD-CSIC, and has coordinated proposal evaluations in the area of Plant Biology, Animal Biology and Ecology at the AEI. She is also a lead author on the Impacts chapter of the IPBES Invasive Alien Species Assessment.

More recently, during the pandemic, she has reflected on the evolution of COVID-19 and found out that the epidemiology of human pathogens and the biology of invasions by plants and animals share many mechanisms, phenomena and challenges, but also potential solutions. She has brought her ideas to a synthesis study published in BioScience, arguing for an interdisciplinary perspective to bring together research on infectious diseases and non-native species invasion, in order to better understand current and future threats in biosecurity, and to improve prevention and response measures.

International Women’s Day 2022: Rita Covas

Rita Covas

For International Women’s Day 2022, we at LifeWatch ERIC are putting eight scientists in the spotlight. Each of the LifeWatch ERIC member states has proposed a figure who has broken boundaries over the course of her lifetime, and is an inspiration to younger generations looking to pursue a career in STEM.

As we explored in the podcast we recorded for The International Day of Women and Girls in Science, women are still underrepresented in various scientific fields, such as engineering, computer science and AI. Additionally, scientific research in general is not only unbalanced in terms of composition (33% female) but also in terms of hierarchy, with only 12% of national science academy members being women, who are disproportionately overlooked when it comes to promotion and grants.

The women at the centre of our campaign are very diverse, hailing from a range of countries and time periods, but they all have one thing in common: overcoming the odds in order to contribute to scientific improvement. We want to draw attention to just a fraction of the women who have defied the cultural barriers pitted against them to bring good to the world, and bring recognition where they might have been overlooked. 

A principal researcher at BIOPOLIS/CIBIO-InBIO and an Honorary Research Associate at the FitzPatrick Institute of African Ornithology, University of Cape Town, Rita Covas has dedicated her career to the study of biodiversity. She focuses her research on birds and especially social behaviour, with relevant implications for our understanding of the evolutionary concepts of solidarity and cooperation. She has a passion for fieldwork and has authored or co-authored 27 scientific publications.

Covas completed her undergraduate studies at the University of Lisbon, in Portugal, which included a graduation dissertation on the biogeography of Mediterranean birds conducted at the French National Centre for Scientific Research (CNRS) in Montpellier. After graduating, she was given a BP Conservation Award, to work on the poorly-known seabird community of São Tome and Principe in the Gulf of Guinea, West Africa. In 1998, she moved to Cape Town to start a PhD at the Percy FitzPatrick Institute studying cooperative breeding behaviour in the Sociable Weaver, and afterwards she moved to the University of Edinburgh and started work on the birds from the Gulf of Guinea islands. 

The quality of her work led her to obtain a Marie Curie fellowship to expand her research at the CEFE-CNRS in Montpellier, France. At the end of 2008, she returned to South Africa to re-launch the sociable weaver study, and in 2019 she was awarded an ERC Consolidator Grant to lead her research in the African savannah, with the goal of studying the relationships between species and the way they cooperate.

Covas’ research demonstrates the intrigue of cooperation from an evolutionary perspective; cooperation is beneficial to the group, but has costs for each individual. Despite this, cooperation is prevalent in nature, from microorganisms to human societies. Understanding what enables evolution and maintains cooperation is a fundamental issue in evolutionary biology.

International Women’s Day 2022: Despoina Vokou 

Despoina Vokou

For International Women’s Day 2022, we at LifeWatch ERIC are putting eight scientists in the spotlight. Each of the LifeWatch ERIC member states has proposed a figure who has broken boundaries over the course of her lifetime, and is an inspiration to younger generations looking to pursue a career in STEM.

As we explored in the podcast we recorded for The International Day of Women and Girls in Science, women are still underrepresented in various scientific fields, such as engineering, computer science and AI. Additionally, scientific research in general is not only unbalanced in terms of composition (33% female) but also in terms of hierarchy, with only 12% of national science academy members being women, who are disproportionately overlooked when it comes to promotion and grants.

The women at the centre of our campaign are very diverse, hailing from a range of countries and time periods, but they all have one thing in common: overcoming the odds in order to contribute to scientific improvement. We want to draw attention to just a fraction of the women who have defied the cultural barriers pitted against them to bring good to the world, and bring recognition where they might have been overlooked. 

Despoina Vokou is a Professor of Ecology in the Aristotle University of Thessaloniki, Greece, where she previously held the roles of Head of the School of Biology and Deputy Dean of the School of Science. She obtained her bachelor’s degree from School of Pharmacy, National and Kapodistrian of the University of Athens, followed by a PhD from the School of Biology at the Aristotle University of Thessaloniki. Her research interests include aerobiology, mycology and plant ecology, Mediterranean ecosystems, biodiversity conservation and management of protected areas. She has published over 110 scientific publications with an h-index of 36. 

Vokou’s expertise in her field has received much recognition, having also been heavily involved in the direction of WWF Greece over the last 30 years; she was invited to represent Greece at the 10th Μeeting of the Conference of the Parties to the Convention on Biological Diversity (CBD COP 10) in Japan, and was president of the Natura 2000 national Committee, as well as being called up as an expert on international environmental issues/WPIEI-Biodiversity for the 2014 Greek Presidency of the EU Council.

The National Bank of Greece invited her to review its report on ‘The environmental, economic and social impacts of climate change in Greece’, and the 5th Assessment of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) invited her to review chapters of its famous report  ‘Climate Change Impacts, Adaptation and Vulnerability’. In addition to being a Member of the Council of European Ecological Federation (EEF) for nearly a decade, Vokou is also a founding member of the Hellenic Ecological Society (HELECOS), which she presided over for several years.

International Women’s Day 2022: Emilia Chiancone

Emilia Chiancone

For International Women’s Day 2022, we at LifeWatch ERIC are putting eight scientists in the spotlight. Each of the LifeWatch ERIC member states has proposed a figure who has broken boundaries over the course of her lifetime, and is an inspiration to younger generations looking to pursue a career in STEM.

As we explored in the podcast we recorded for The International Day of Women and Girls in Science, women are still underrepresented in various scientific fields, such as engineering, computer science and AI. Additionally, scientific research in general is not only unbalanced in terms of composition (33% female) but also in terms of hierarchy, with only 12% of national science academy members being women, who are disproportionately overlooked when it comes to promotion and grants.

The women at the centre of our campaign are very diverse, hailing from a range of countries and time periods, but they all have one thing in common: overcoming the odds in order to contribute to scientific improvement. We want to draw attention to just a fraction of the women who have defied the cultural barriers pitted against them to bring good to the world, and bring recognition where they might have been overlooked. 

Born in Bari in 1938, the late Emilia Chiancone was Professor Emeritus of Molecular Biology at the “Sapienza” University of Rome and the first woman to become President of the Italian Academy of Sciences. Looking back at Chiancone’s life, we are inspired by the story of a prominent Italian scientist who, throughout her life, continuously broke barriers in terms of gender, and knocked down boundaries between disciplines.

Having graduated in Milan in Biological sciences, she moved to Rome which became the centre of her career. Together with the Nobel laureate Rita Levi Montalcini, Cecilia Saccone and Virginia Volterra, Emilia Chiancone was one of the first women to lead an Institute of the National Research Council of Italy (CNR), the Centre of Investigation on Molecular Biology, which under her guidance developed into the Institute of Molecular Biology and Pathology, which she chaired from 2002 to 2008. In 2007 she received the Antonio Feltrinelli Award for Biological Sciences from the Accademia dei Lincei, and in 2015, the Italian Society of Science History gave her its Lifetime Achievement Award for her commitment to the dissemination of science, once again the only woman recognised with this honour. Altogether, she authored over 200 publications in international journals, several monographs and two patents, gaining recognition for her studies on the evolution of the allosteric regulatory mechanisms of enzymes.

From 2011 until her passing, Chiancone was the first female President of the Italian Academy of Sciences, characterising her mandates with a series of initiatives which were positively welcomed by both the scientific community and wider society. She put a special emphasis on scientific dissemination, a pertinent example being  the organisation alongside the CNR of “Wheats&Women international conference – Carlotta Award 2018”. Despite a career in biochemistry, it was under her presidency that the National Academy of Sciences joined LifeWatch Italy in 2012; her commitment was valuable and unwavering, and permanently marked the story of this infrastructure. In her final years, she worked tirelessly to foster the connection between science and society, the participation of students in research projects and a focus on science in schools. Together with CNR and LifeWatch Italy, she was the promoter and organiser of a number of citizen science initiatives, among which the TrovaPiante di Villa Torlonia (an interactive multimedia guide to identify local flora), a complete guide to the rich flora of the metropolitan area of Rome (including over 1600 infrageneric taxa), and the first Italian Citizen Science Conference,  “Biodiversity, Networks, Open Science and Platforms”, as part of a prolonged effort to make science more inclusive. An excellent scientist and resolute woman, Emilia Chiancone distinguished herself for her expertise, dedication and commitment – a true role model and inspiration for all those who want to pursue a career in research, particularly young women.