To celebrate International Day of Women and Girls in Science this February 11, IUPAC is pleased to announce the recipients of the IUPAC 2025 Awards for Distinguished Women in Chemistry or Chemical Engineering:
Yu-Ju Chen, Institute of Chemistry, Academia Sinica, China/Taipei
Stefanie Dehnen, Karlsruhe Institute of Technology, Germany
Hemda Garelick, Middlesex University, London, United Kingdom
Marie-Claude Heuzey, Polytechnique Montréal, Canada
Young-Shin Jun, Washington University in St. Louis, Missouri, USA
Tanja Junkers, Monash University, Melbourne, Australia
Zhang Lin, Central South University, Yuelu District, Hunan, China/Beijing
Zhimin Liu, Institute of Chemistry, Chinese Academy of Sciences, China/Beijing
Jane Catherine Ngila, The African Foundation for Women and Youth in Education, Science, Technology & Innovation, Nairobi, Kenya
Ah-Hyung Alissa Park, UCLA Samueli School of Engineering, University of California, Los Angeles, USA
Vivian W.W. Yam, The University of Hong Kong, Hong Kong, China
Xuehua Zhang, University of Alberta, Edmonton, Alberta, Canada
The awards program, initiated as part of the 2011 International Year of Chemistry, was created to acknowledge and promote the work of women chemists and chemical engineers worldwide. Each year since 2011, the award has gained increasing attention in the global community. The twelve awardees for 2025 have been selected based on excellence in basic or applied research, distinguished accomplishments in teaching or education, or demonstrated leadership or managerial excellence in the chemical sciences, with a particular focus on leadership and community service. The awards presentation will be held during the IUPAC World Chemistry Congress in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia, in July 2025.
Dr. Mark Cesa, 2014-2015 President of IUPAC and Chair of the IUPAC Committee for Ethics, Diversity, Equity and Inclusion, says, “IUPAC is delighted to recognize the 2025 class of recipients of the IUPAC Awards for Distinguished Women in Chemistry or Chemical Engineering. This class of awardees, selected from a highly accomplished set of women chemists and chemical engineers from around the world, is distinguished by not only the extraordinarily high quality of their research but also by their commitment to leadership as educators, editors and public servants. IUPAC acknowledges the impressive contributions of all of the nominees and congratulates the recipients of this year’s Awards. Their careers are inspiring to everyone, and we look forward eagerly to their continued success.”
The International Day of Women and Girls in Science is a global day celebrating achievement and promoting full and equal access to and participation in science for women and girls. The day marks a call to action for gender equality and the empowerment of women and girls. The year 2025 is also the International Year of Quantum Science and Technology. IUPAC is celebrating both of these global initiatives with a Global Women’s Breakfast networking event (www.iupac.org/gwb/), to be held on February 11, 2025 on the theme of “Accelerating Equity in Science”.
A list of recipients of the Award since its inception may be found HERE (PDF).
About IUPAC:
IUPAC was formed in 1919 by chemists from industry and academia. Since then, the Union has succeeded in fostering worldwide communications in the chemical sciences and in uniting academic, industrial and public sector chemistry in a common language. IUPAC is recognized as the world authority on chemical nomenclature, terminology, standardized methods for measurement, atomic weights and many other critically evaluated data. In more recent years, IUPAC has been pro-active in establishing a wide range of conferences and projects designed to promote and stimulate modern developments in chemistry, and also to assist in aspects of chemical education and the public understanding of chemistry. More information about IUPAC and its activities is available at www.iupac.org.
—
See https://iupac.org/what-we-do/awards/iupac-distinguished-women/ or originating call for nominations
Announcement to be published in Chem Int April 2025
See also PAC Jan 2024 for a special collection of invited papers by recipients of the 2023 IUPAC Distinguished Women in Chemistry and Chemical Engineering Awards. Preface also reproduced in Chem Int July 2024, p.32.