Meet the World's Most Influential Women Engineers
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Jul 3, 2021 Meet The World’s Most Influential Women Engineers Michael T. Nietzel Senior Contributor I am a former university president who writes about higher education. Barbara Liskov (left), the 2008 ACM Turing Award winner and a professor of engineering at MIT ... [+] AP IMAGES FOR ASSOCIATION FOR COMPUTING MACHINERY Dr. Barbara Liskov, Institute Professor of Engineering at MIT, has been ranked first in a new release identifying the most influential women engineers in the world. The list comes from Academic Influence, the academic rankings system that uses artificial intelligence to search massive databases and measure the impact of work by individuals in various fields. Relying on machine-learning technology developed with funding from the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency, Academic Influence searches open-source data in two sources - Wikipedia and CrossRef - for papers, chapters, books, and citations to individuals worldwide. Collectively, these databases contain billions of continuously updated data points about millions of individuals’ achievements. But the method yields more than just a popularity contest of the individuals who gain the most public mentions. It focuses on the intersection of name mentions and discipline mentions so that individuals are credited with “hits” only when their names also intersect with mentions of the professional fields in which they excel. When cumulated, these intersectional mentions constitute a person’s influence score. (More details about the ranking methodology can be found here.) On June 23, in celebration of International Women in Engineering Day 2021, an annual recognition organized by the Women’s Engineering Society, Academic Influence announced its compilation of the 35 women making the greatest impact in engineering. Here’s some basic information about them. The top 10 women on the list, in order, were: • Barbara Liskov, Massachusetts Institute of Technology • Ruzena Bajcsy, University of California, Berkeley • Dina Katabi, Massachusetts Institute of Technology • Diane Greene, American entrepreneur • Jennifer Widom, Stanford University • Barbara Oakley, Oakland University • Mae C. Jemison, physician, former astronaut and the first Black woman to travel into space • Adah Almutairi, University of California, Davis • Manuela M. Veloso, Carnegie Mellon University • Daniela L. Rus, Massachusetts Institute of Technology Of the 35, almost three-quarters (26) of the women were employed in America, either in academic institutions, businesses or as entrepreneurs. Among universities, MIT led the list with four of the women holding position there (Dina Katabi, Barbara Liskov, Dava Newman, and Daniela Rus). Two of the women - Barbara Oakley and Jennifer Widom - have been pioneers in the development of Massive Open Online Courses, or MOOCs, the breakthrough in online education that’s given millions of students affordable access to a wide range of higher education content. The influencers represent the full array of engineering sub- disciplines, including computer science, mechanical engineering, materials science, electrical engineering, chemical engineering and biomedical specialties. Several have been CEOs of major technology companies, such as Ursula Burns the former CEO of Xerox; Anousheh Ansari, who currently heads up Prodea Systems, prior to being the co-founder and CEO of Telecom Technologies; Diane Greene, who was CEO of Google Cloud as well as the founder of multiple tech companies; and Lisa Su, President and CEO of Advanced Micro Devices. They include winners of highly prestigious prizes such as Cal Tech’s Frances Arnold (Nobel Prize in chemistry), Barbara Liskov (Turing Award), and Dina Katabi (named a MacArthur Fellow and recipient of the ACM Prize in Computing). Many have been elected to membership in the most elite national academies such as the National Academy of Engineering, the National Academy of Sciences and the American Academy of Arts and Sciences. A number of the influencers have led academic institutions, directed prominent nonprofit organizations or headed up federal agencies. For example, Gilda Barabino is the president of the Olin College of Engineering, where she is also a professor of biomedical and chemical engineering. Elizabeth Cannon is the former president of the University of Calgary. Wanda Austin was CEO of The Aerospace Corporation. • Arati Prabhakar headed two major government agencies - DARPA, the United States Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency and NIST, the National Institute of Standards and Technology. Nominated by President Barack Obama, Dava Newman served as Deputy Administrator of NASA. While many of those on the list have helped blaze the trail for women to enter and flourish in engineering and other STEM fields, one in particular deserves special mention for her work in this area. It’s Dawn Bonfield, of Aston University in Birmingham, England. Bonfield is the founder and director of Towards Vision, a company that works for greater diversity and inclusion in engineering. She is also past president of the Women's Engineering Society. Commenting on the new list, Jed Macosko, President of Academic Influence and professor of physics at Wake Forest University, said, "Engineering has a reputation as a mostly male profession. We want to set the record straight and let more people know that women engineers are not only growing in number but also are driving the field forward in new and creative ways. They bring innovative thinking and bold solutions that make their profession better, and more people need to know who they are and see why they are the vanguard of a new era in engineering." Michael T. Nietzel https://www.forbes.com/sites/michaeltnietzel/2021/07/03/meet-the-worlds-most-influential- women-engineers/?sh=4454482e34c0&utm_source=NAE+Spotlight&utm_campaign=80180e5dc6- EMAIL_CAMPAIGN_2018_01_30_COPY_01&utm_medium=email&utm_term=0_0b3cbbfaea- 80180e5dc6-246063637 Highly Influential Women in Engineering Today From pioneers in engineering sub-disciplines like computer science and electrical engineering to the newest generation of revolutionary thinkers in areas like nano-medicine and nuclear power, these 35 female engineers showcase the brilliant minds driving today’s leading-edge innovations, developing tomorrow’s life-saving discoveries, and generally taking us to thrilling new heights of scientific understanding. Women have made important gains in engineering professions over the last several decades. According to Census reporting, just 3% of engineering professionals were women in 1970. By 2019, that number had quintupled to 15%, a significant gain but one that suggests a field still dramatically tilted toward opportunities for men. This makes the ground-breaking achievements of the women on our list all the more remarkable. From pioneers in engineering sub-disciplines like computer science and electrical engineering to the newest generation of revolutionary thinkers in areas like nano- medicine and nuclear powers, these 35 influential women engineers showcase the brilliant minds driving today’s leading-edge innovations, developing tomorrow’s life-saving discoveries, and generally taking us to thrilling new heights of scientific understanding. While the Census figures show how far we’ve come, the data also show that there is still a great deal of work to be done in advancing equal representation in engineering. To this end, let the women on this list be an inspiration to the next generation of analysts, innovators, and influencers. 35 Highly Influential Women in Engineering 2000-2020 • Adah Almutairi 1976 - Present (45 years) #13416 Person’s Overall Influence Adah Almutairi is a scholar, inventor, and entrepreneur. Almutairi is a Professor of Pharmaceutical Chemistry; affiliate faculty in the departments of Bioengineering and NanoEngineering; and Director of the Center for Excellence in Nanomedicine and Engineering in the Institute of Engineering in Medicine at the University of California, San Diego . Her work focuses on nanomedicine, nanotechnology, chemistry and polymer science. Almutairi is a 2016 Kavli Fellow and has received numerous honors and awards such as the NIH director’s new innovator award in 2009 for her work on “Chemically Amplified Response Strategies for Medical Sciences”. Almutairi holds over a dozen U.S. and International patents, many of which are currently licensed in Industry. Almutairi is the Founder of eLux Medical Inc View profile 1. Rose Amal 1965 - Present (56 years) #165378 Person's Overall Influence Rose Amal is the Scientia Professor and ARC Laureate Fellow and director of the Particles and Catalysis Research Group in the School of Chemical Engineering at the University of New South Wales. She earned a bachelor of engineering degree in chemical engineering and a Ph.D in chemical engineering from the University of New South Wales. Her research has focused on the design and development of nanomaterials and systems for chemical and solar energy conversion. View profile 2. Anousheh Ansari 1966 - Present (55 years) #9427 Person's Overall Influence Anousheh Ansari is an Iranian American engineer and co- founder and chairwoman of Prodea Systems. Her previous business accomplishments include serving as co-founder and CEO of Telecom Technologies, Inc. The Ansari family is also the title sponsor of the Ansari X Prize. On September 18, 2006, a few days after her 40th birthday, she became the first Iranian and first female Muslim in space. Ansari was the fourth overall self-funded space tourist, and the