(CNN) – Congratulations to NASA by noting that 25% of the team behind the ship New Horizons are women, a figure that is higher than the percentage of women engaged in engineering and physics (about 15-20%) in the United States or academic specialists on issues of space (about 13%).
The fact that there are so many women in this team partly because it is a young group, and the proportion of women tends to be higher among teams of specialists younger.
And also the principal investigator of the project New Horizons , Alan Stern, actively recruited women and young scientists for this work. Similarly it influenced the positive feedback from young students who see older women as their role models.
Fran Bagenal, science team leader of particles and plasma in the mission New Horizons has devoted a considerable amount of time to mentor young women and to work for increased participation
“Programs Voyager and Galileo [to explore Jupiter] which started in the 70s, hopefully they have some women. Cassini [Mission to Saturn] was better … And once you get to a decent number, enters and grows a little more, “he said.
But you must be aware of complacency he says. “Some of the young women might think it’s not important because they are used to it. But it did not happen. People worked hard to increase the number of women “
There is something special to find yourself in a room full of women working on a NASA mission look around and think..” Wow, something it is different. “It is amazing and bodes well for the future of the space agency.
The flight of New Horizons Pluto this week has inspired millions of people, both as with its discovery by Clyde Tombaugh 85 years.
Children from around the world learn about Pluto and the Kuiper Belt mission by New Horizons . Half of these children are female. Hopefully they have the same opportunities as men to become the scientists and engineers who will lead the exploration of tomorrow.
Some of the key women in the team New Horizons are:
Fran Bagenal
Science Team Leader particle and plasma in the mission New Horizons to Pluto, space science and retired professor from the University of Colorado in Boulder.
Fran and I went postdoctoral students at the Center for Space Research at MIT in the 80s, a time when there were very few women in space science.
Alice Bowman
Director of mission operations, by the Operations Center of the Mission for the “awakening” critical end of New Horizons in December.
According to NASA, “She reads each line of code before being sent on a journey of four hours to New Horizons “, a sign of the meticulous attitude becomes successful space missions.
Tiffany Finley
Head of science operations team, who transforms scientific priorities in command of the aircraft. Finley defines gender balance in the team New Horizons as “refreshing”.
Yanping Guo
Leader of mission design, responsible for creating the path of the ship, whose path had a very narrow margin of success since It depended in part on the severity of Jupiter. The arrival of New Horizons Pluto within 72 seconds planned was a great triumph.
Leslie Young
Scientific project assistant in charge of planning for the Pluto encounter science team.
And here it is the complete list of the women team. Bravo to all!
Amy Shira Teitel, Cindy Conrad, Sarah Hamilton, Allisa Earle, Leslie Young, Melissa Jones, Katie Bechtold, Becca Know, Kelsi Singer, Amanda Zangari, Coralie Jackman, Helen Hart, Fran Bagenal, Ann Harch, Jillian Redfern, Tiffany Finley, Heather Elliot, Nicole Martin, Guo Yanping, Cathy Olkin, Valerie Mallder, Rayna Tedford, Silvia Protopapa, Martha Kusterer, Kim Ennico, Ann Verbiscer, Bonnie Buratti, Sarah Bucior, Veronica Bray, Emma Birath, Carly Howett Alice Bowman, Priya Dharmavaram, Sarah Flanigan, Debi Rose, Sheila Zurvalec, Adriana Ocampo and Jo-Anne Kierzkowski.
* This commentary was written by Meg Urry, professor of physics and astronomy at Yale University and director of the Center for Astronomy and Astrophysics from the same institution. The opinions expressed are solely those of the author.
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