Nicola Spaldin receives L'Oréal-Unesco For Women in Science award
ETH Professor Nicola Spaldin will today be honoured for her revolutionary research in the field of materials science. In Paris, she is set to receive the L'Oréal-Unesco For Women in Science award for Europe, which carries prize money of 100,000 euros.
2017 marks the 19th L’Oréal-Unesco For Women in Science awards in Paris. The awards aim to recognise and support outstanding female researchers from all around the world. Nicola Spaldin, ETH Professor in the Department of Materials, will receive this prestigious award for the Europe region. The British scientist's research lays the theoretical foundations for the understanding and development of so-called multiferroic materials, which have the unique property of being simultaneously magnetic and electric. As Spaldin previously remarked in ETH News, she is particularly fascinated by her research field's interdisciplinarity – the combination of physics, chemistry and material properties.
The ETH researcher has already received numerous prestigious scientific awards such as the Max Rössler Prize in 2012 and the Körber-Preis in 2015. Three years ago, her students also honoured the British-born scientist with the Golden Owl for her commitment to teaching.
Spaldin became interested in mathematics and natural sciences while still at school, and began her academic career with a degree in geology and chemistry at the University of Cambridge. In 1996, she obtained her doctorate in chemistry at the University of California, Berkeley. She was then a post-doctoral fellow at Yale University in New Haven before moving back to California, where she was Assistant Professor (1997–2002) and Associate Professor (2002–2006) in the Materials Department at UC Santa Barbara. She was made a Full Professor in 2006, and moved to ETH Zurich in 2011.
L'Oréal-Unesco For Women in Science
Since 1998, the external page L’Oréal Corporate Foundation and Unesco have been committed to the promotion of women in science. At the annual awards ceremony, five researchers – one each from Africa, Europe, Latin America, North America and Asia – are recognised for their outstanding research. The jury is comprised of 12 distinguished scientists and the award carries prize money of 100,000 euros.