“He started as a child, through my curiosity.” Rosa Vásquez Espinoza

To elucidate our questions about the present and future of the role of women in this matter, we speak with two referents of science and told us how the discovery of their vocation was.

“It started since I was a child and I think it began through my curiosity for everything in nature: Why the stars aligned in certain constellations, why the plants had some smell at certain times of the day, why the animals reacted with certain stimuli ”Account Rosa Vásquez Espinoza, recognized on the BBC100Women 2024 list.

This curiosity led her to develop her career between avant -garde science and traditional knowledge.

Another detail is that thanks to the game he could really cultivate his passion for science. Nature was always close in his life, either because of the garden he had at home or for the traditional knowledge of his family that comes from the central Amazon. That connection “It meant time to play”.

A similar case happened with Yulan Hernández, researcher and professor at the Pontifical Catholic University of Peru (PUCP). “Since childhood I loved it, that is, to try to explain the things I saw on a day -to -day basis, why this was done so, why light and how these things work”also recalls the doctor, Spanish by birth and will soon finish processing Peruvian citizenship.

But, of course, this path has not been simple. Hernández mentions that the difference that girls and girls could study was very marked before, girls and girls could study, “And today these barriers like that they lie a little”.

Education, a key to science

In a time dominated by fakenews on the Internet, denialism and manipulation, education seems to be the best way to resist, school and home education.

“Having good teachers, although it sounds topical, is superimporting. I had two teachers, a chemistry professor and a physics teacher who loved to go to the laboratory, do experiments, explain everything, and they put me the bichito of science. When choosing the race I had it very clearly ”he explains from his experience. She is now a doctor in chemical sciences and develops research for medical treatments.

He considered it “Important to work programs from school” that stimulate the curiosity of girls and boys.

But education is not only in classrooms. This is something that was very clear about Dr. Rosa Vásquez Espinoza’s family, and her mother was key in training her as a researcher.

“My mother always drove me to read a little more. If I didn’t know, and she didn’t have the answers either, she told me ‘Look for it, look for it in the book’ (at that time the Internet just began to emerge) “remember.

On the one hand, his mother taught him what the investigation meant, “To understand that science gave so many answers, but generated even more questions, and it was like an insatiable curiosity”. His grandmother taught him the connection with nature, and “When they moved to the city (Lima)she loaded all that knowledge, made her little garden, with all her seedlings “garden where he discovered curiosity for natural sciences.

Projects that continue advancing

The two researchers continue their work. Today Yulan Hernández develops a new method in the PUCP laboratories for the treatment of colorectal cancer, and is inspired by his doctoral thesis. The project has received Conytec financing.

It is about the detection of carcinoembryonic antigen (CEA). “What happens is that we all have a small amount and what we want is to quantify, see that we have a higher level than usual. What we want is not only to see if there is or not “he explains.

This method will determine several levels of the disease. The tests that are performed are like the tests to detect COVID-19, or pregnancy, and the result is analyzed in a special box that has designed its equipment where you can take a picture even using a cell phone. “What we do is quantify the pixels that give us, basically what is the intensity that has been marked”indicates. This is done through software.

On the other hand, researcher Rosa Vásquez Espinoza indicated that her project continues the development of the first distribution map of stingless bees, with the intention of understanding the impact of deforestation and climate change.

It also advanced a new work that consists in the regeneration of a degraded area, impacted, by fires, but using native plants. “Although it sounds a bit illogical, reforestation in the jungle is not always done with native plants, which interrupts the ecosystem a lot, but we are doing it with communities”he said. In addition, it is using trap cameras and other technologies to be able to regenerate populations of vulnerable animals.

Look: Santos Batidrones!: Swiss engineers propose drones with “bat wings” to improve their efficiency

Thus, science is very wide, there are many disciplines where you can work, either in medicine, chemistry, biology, engineering, physics, mathematics, etc., with more space for women. “I am excited to imagine what can be done in the future with more women and girls in Peru. Talent is infinite and I think the Peruvian woman has a unique resilience and creativity “commented the scientist awarded by the BBC chain.

Meanwhile, Hernández left a message to girls who feel vocation for science: “Do not set limits, follow your dreams, if in reality what you like is science, technology, engineering, that nobody tells you that they can’t”Said the researcher, about this date, Women and Girl Day in Science.