Why not me?

The International Day of Women and Girls in Science, established by the United Nations General Assembly and implemented by UNESCO, is celebrated worldwide on 11 February: the four organizations that make up STAR, the Trentino alliance for advanced education and research, FBK, FEM, University of Trento and MUSE, have launched a video to recognize the fundamental role of women and girls in STEM disciplines – Science, Technology, Engineering, Mathematics. 
A multi-voiced story on the occasion of the International Day of Women and Girls in Science. The protagonists of "Why not me?" the video created by STAR under the patronage of the Autonomous Province of Trento to raise awareness and promote the full and equal participation of women in science, are four researchers: zoologist Giulia Bombieri of the Conservation Biology Area of the Muse Science Museum, Cinzia Menapace, metallurgical engineer of the Department of Industrial Engineering of the University of Trento, Federica Mantegazzini, physicist of the Center for Sensors and Devices of Fondazione Bruno Kessler, and Luana Bontempo, a chemist and head of the Traceability Unit of the Edmund Mach Foundation.  
Their testimonies, which reflect their ambition, curiosity and passion, shed light on the motivations, choices and commitment that provide the foundations for their work in their field of research.
Four interviews to inspire other girls to study scientific subjects, follow their talents and counter gender inequality in science: based on the most recent Unesco report, only 30% of women globally manage to pursue a career in the scientific field.  
There are more women graduates in Italy than men (59%), but they are a minority in scientific subjects: only 16.5% of young women graduate in STEM subjects, against 37% of men (ISTAT data). Women continue to be underrepresented, particularly in the fields of engineering (6.6%) and ICT (1.7%).
In STEM areas, only one in five full professors is a woman. Among the Rectors, women are just 7 out of more than 80.
But something is changing. Many organizations and institutions around the world are working towards the same goal: to encourage a new generation of women scientists to tackle the major challenge of our time.  
The teaser of “Why not me?” will be launched simultaneously on the social media channels of the four institutions while the full video will be available at: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xkGPSWwmfvw

BRIEF PORTRAITS OF THE SCIENTISTS 

Cinzia Menapace is Professor of Metallurgy at the Department of Industrial Engineering of the University of Trento.
She earned a PhD in Metallurgical Engineering from the University of Padova. 
She studies the properties and behaviour of metals. She is the department delegate for orientation and for disability and specific learning disorders.
She loves microscopy in the laboratory but also teaching.

Giulia Bombieri is a zoologist at the MUSE Museum – Research and Collections Office, Conservation Biology. She completed her studies with various experiences in Italy and other European countries.
In 2020, she completed her PhD at the University of Oviedo in partnership with MUSE, during which she took part in studies on the ecology and behaviour of the brown bear in the Cantabrian Mountains. She has been a researcher at MUSE since 2020, where she works on various aspects related to the ecology of large carnivores and their coexistence with humans, including within the LIFE WolfAlps EU project.

Federica Mantegazzini of FBK has a PhD in Physics from the University of Heidelberg (Germany).
Since 2022, she is a tenure track researcher at the Sensors and Devices Centre of the Bruno Kessler Foundation in Trento. She currently coordinates a young research team focused on the development of superconducting quantum devices, covering both design and microfabrication activities, as well as cryogenic characterization measurements and the final experiments.

Luana Bontempo of FEM has a degree in Pharmaceutical Chemistry and Technology and a PhD in Food Science.
Since 2001 she has been working as a researcher at Istituto Agrario di San Michele all'Adige - Fondazione Edmund Mach. Since November 2019, she is the head of the Traceability Unit of the Research and Innovation Centre, she has been mainly involved in isotopic and nuclear magnetic resonance analyses applied to the traceability of agricultural and food products but also to animal ecology and archaeology.