#79. The Journey of Women in Neurocience - Ginevra Sperandio & Riya Verma

This episode features two members of Women in Neuroscience UK, Ginevra Sperandio and Riya Verma, discussing their journeys into neuroscience, the importance of women's health research, and the mission of their organization. They explore the challenges faced by women in neuroscience, the need for better representation, and the significance of patient voices in research. The discussion also highlights innovative ideas for future research and how individuals can get involved with Women in Neuroscience UK.

Check WiNUK out here: https://www.womeninneuroscienceuk.org

Chapters

• 0:00 Origin Stories
• 6:31 Research Focus: Pain and Neuroscience
• 17:20 Spotlight on Women's Health
• 22:48 The Importance of Representation
• 33:45 The Need for Women's Health Research
• 40:22 WiN UK's Mission and Growth
• 57:35 Dream Research Projects and Ethical Considerations
• 1:01:02 Bridging the Gap: Research and Real-World Application
• 1:04:52 Hot Takes
• 1:09:30 Getting Involved with Women in Neuroscience UK

Transcript

0:04

Hello, hello, hello. Welcome to the Smooth Brain Society. Today we don't have just one, but we have two guests. We are joined by two brilliant members of Women in Neuroscience UK, WiN UK, and Sperandio and Riya Verma. Ginevra is a pain researcher whose work explores the brain mechanisms behind how we experience and process pain. And she also brings a creative edge to WiN UK as their graphics lead, shaping the organization communicates science and community through visual storytelling. Riya completed her BSc in neuroscience at Warwick before moving into healthcare communications and is now carving out a career in medical charity sector. A social media lead at WiN UK, she's passionate about women's health equity and opening up conversations that connect neuroscience to the real world. Today we'll be spending the first half getting to know their journeys, passions and research interests. And the second half exploring the work they're doing within UK to build visibility, community and opportunity across the field. Whether you're a neuroscientist, you care particularly about women's health research, or you just hear for the stories and science behind it all, this one's for you. Welcome Ginny and Riya. Woo! Thank you for having us. No, thank you for joining. So I guess the first question will open up to maybe I'll come to you first, Jeannie, then we'll go to Ria. What is your origin story? What got you into neuroscience? So well, have like, I was born and raised in Rome, where I did both my bachelor and my master um degree and I graduated first in psychology uh and health and then in cognitive neuroscience. uh So let's say I think I, during like the bachelor, I realized that the exams I was like enjoying the most where, psychobiology actually my love is like a biology. I didn't then ended up there, but ah that was like my first love and a neuroscience. So then when it came to picking up a master, I thought like, okay, this is the way. And in my university, it was like a master that was entirely in English. It was kind of focused on uh research and international projects. So then I was like, okay, this is also perfect for me. So then I went for that. And then, yeah, that was like how I started. And I decided to say, okay, I want to be a scientist. After that, I wanted to go and try a PhD also because I did my masters during pandemic. So basically all my dream of like, I'm going to be a neuroscientist ended up if like half of what was supposed to be. So I also couldn't do anything like in the lab for my master thesis. So I was like, okay, I think I want to give it a proper try to neuroscience. uh And I ended up uh kind of traveling all over Europe with Marie Curie fellowship in pain. and that is how I ended up in pain. you Perfect, so Sandra now you've ended up in Copenhagen. Yes, still following Sir India Scientist dream because I'm a lecturer now, uh but yeah. Fantastic. So yeah, and here we are now and you're with the WiN UK as well. So we'll talk a bit about WiN UK a little bit more later because I also want to know how you got into that as well, but I'll hold fire. Ria, can you tell us a little bit about your origin story as well? Yes, so I obviously completed my BSc at Warwick. Last year I graduated. So prior to starting university, initially I wanted to study medicine. in my final year of A-levels, I had Covid, but I had really bad long Covid. So that kind of That kind of period was over the medicine deadline for my school's application. So said, OK, I can either reapply, take a gap year, reapply, or neuroscience was kind of seen as my backup. Or I wanted to do medicine with an intercalated year within neuroscience. People thought I was crazy and insane. But that's something that I've really enjoyed since. young age because I like knowing why people are the way that they are and kind of understanding how the brain kind of controls every single situation and every single emotion within your body and every single mechanism. So then I decided to say, you know what, let's go into neuroscience and if I want to then I can do postgraduate medicine. So I applied for university, for neuroscience at university and ended up going to Warwick to study neuroscience. Neuroscience at Warwick is very new, so we were the second cohort to complete m our degree. So was very new. Everything was kind of still kind of figuring things out. m So again, there wasn't a solid foundation in terms of m any other routes after university apart from academia. But I knew that I didn't feel as though research was for me, so I didn't want to stay in academia. So I went to explore other avenues. So after leaving university, m I explored health care communications. Unfortunately, that didn't seem right for a right fit for me, but that's completely OK. So now I'm working to kind of create a career within medical charities. So similar to the work that we do at Women in Neuroscience UK and kind of a similar kind of ethos, because I do believe that that's kind of my purpose in terms of creating a difference within health care and within kind of medicine. That's perfect. So when you say medical charities, things like the British Heart Foundation. Yeah, yeah, I think you're the founder of WIN is currently at British Heart Foundation. yeah. I think that ethos really aligns with women in neuroscience. think the way that this organization runs, I think it's very similar to the way that medical charities operate in terms of they really care for their patients, care for the work that they're doing as well. Yeah. Yeah. we'll see you there soon. How exciting. Do you have any questions here? All right. Well, I've I've got a few. I guess the first question which I have is to Ginny, which was you kind of spoke a little bit about how you're chasing the neuroscientist dream or like to or trying to be a neuroscience researcher. And you made it almost sound like you fell into pain research. I was kind of interested in sort of that, like what you do within pain research, because we had Arnash Tamashawskasan who does pain research in a very different way he was looking at uh chronic pain, what kind of pain do you look at, what kind of research do you do? um So my research was mainly focused on kind of building predictive models. uh I think like ah the goal of uh most researchers is actually to find a way to stop researching that field. the goal is always to kind of predict or uh find a solution. um And my interest was coming from uh kind of adverse life experiences, maltreatment and abuses, that was my primary interest. And pain in that kind of way was the consequence that is often seen in people with such stories. And uh in my bigger like program, I had access to big longitudinal data sets across Europe with the several different countries. One of my uh source of data was the Immigrant Project. That is a European project that followed uh adolescence from 13 years old till 25, and it's still ongoing. So like 10 years span of data dream of every single researcher, I guess. uh So in that way, I followed up. um uh a group of subjects uh of participating in that and trying to understand the effect of all the different adverse life events on development of pain and comorbidities. Also, another problem that comes with pain is that it rarely comes alone. It is often accompanied by uh depression and anxiety on top of that, but a lot of other mental health issues. So another core part of my project was the comorbidity component. So in short, what I found is that there are some adverse experiences that are mainly kind of go into the group of deprivation experiences that goes from like neglect experiences, but also um like lack of health support and so on. uh This looked uh significant in affecting the uh brain volume of insulin, which in terms was significant in the relationship between pain and anxiety and the development of pain and anxiety in comorbidity. This means that insulin is a really important area uh of the brain because it kind of merges the affective components and the somatic components. uh Being like smaller was also like impaired and ideally was uh causing like the development of pain and anxiety. On the other side, my other like big longitudinal study was uh on cancer pain, cancer patient, patients mainly breast and lung cancer. And in there I tried to develop uh kind of algorithm that could be used in clinical practice to uh kind of predict post-surgical pain and eventually follow the patients differently. So what I found was that both somatic components like age and preoperative pain, which it's nothing new in the field, but from my interest, the psychological component uh that was important was distress, uh which is triggered, especially in cancer patients when... they get the diagnosis and then they start like this never ending journey where you don't know when or if it's ending. And it starts with a really big component in the anxiety aspects. So this kind of three questions can be used in hopefully in clinical practice to flag patients before the surgery and then eventually follow them up. So that is like briefly my research. em No, that's incredibly interesting. So just to clarify the insula size, so insula is a region in the brain, and that size being important in pain processing. um You said that it was smaller. Is this a longitudinal study? Or did you look at insula growth over time? m so... eh I guess because my question was going to be that if you look at it over time, is there also sort of, is there anything in the data which I know this is very hard and if you even know, but like, was there anything in the data would suggest that if certain conditions were met or improved that like insular size was improved or like pain was better regulated considering one, how plastic the brain is, but two, because you're looking at adolescence, right? So the brain's still growing. I was just interested or curious in that. Yes, so to go into the details of the study, um actually this uh mediation model was significant in late adolescence, so like around 18 years old, and then we couldn't find it significant in adulthood, so when they are like 20 something. uh This could get into many different like... em conclusions or hypothesis on explanations on that. uh Mainly, as you mentioned, like uh the brain is still plastic because we're talking about like still developmental stages. uh Another component that was important was the fact that there was also a peak in the type of experience that they were having at that time. And another part that is really close to my interest was the sex differences. So if we then split the group, most of the results that I found in my research was actually just significant in the girl group. And that is another huge topic in the field. So, so what does that mean? What does that sort of mean? If the significance was only one way for for somebody who doesn't study it, what would that sort of? Yeah. Mean. So analyzing the data altogether or separated by facts, so having the group of girls and boys separate. um This kind of, of course, comes into lowering the power of the analysis. um So this is why it's often the case in research where you don't see the data split. it is still important. Both results are significant in a way that it is important to see the group as a whole and separate because you also find of course uh trends that cannot be uh seen if you split the groups. But yeah, like uh most of the results then were kind of null and in the group of boys if we analyze them alone. So what saying is there was just significance in the women. Did the men show any differences compared to women or were you just specifically looking at the insula? At the brain level, yes, I only looked at the insula uh and the group was really small to uh properly run an analysis. But in terms of all the other uh factors, for example, the incidence of the adverse experiences or uh the incidence of pain and the comorbidities, that was significantly different between the groups. And did you use, was it in your imaging, did you use to look at this or? Yeah, images. it was like in the project there is also fMRI. It was like not of interest for me. So I don't know like the functional component of that. But in terms of like volume and size, that was MRI data. And was it, so was this a research-based or did you get it from the hospitals themselves? So who were you working with when you were doing this? um So this is a huge longitudinal study um that involved several different collection sites, so both research institutes but also hospitals. And I also had data from the UK, so there is a lot uh from different university sites, um so it's kind of a mix of the two. Okay, so very briefly. yeah, just to be sure, these are not patients. it's only general public, the collection of the data, and the recruitment was run in schools. So we ended up maybe having people being patients on and on, but the initial recruitment was excluding all those criteria. you so yeah kind of a lot more research focused and going into hospitals so because you're like very interested in pain and a whole PhD in it. Riya when you're kind of, because I appreciate you're the social media lead but just you know in general, m is there something you particularly enjoy writing about or sharing when you know you're doing your health communications or your medical comms and charity work that you want to do in the future? I think it would definitely be women's health. So even at Women in Neuroscience UK, I also work as the blog writer for the reality section. So within this, I've tried to kind of incorporate my interests for women's health within the blogs that I'm writing. So the one that I enjoyed writing most was about PMDD, so pre-menstrual dysphoric disorder. So I think having a personal experience myself with it and kind of exploring it much deeper. and kind of understanding why it occurs or kind of grabbing as much research as there is available. Because obviously the funding within women's health is so poor at the moment, so, so, so poor. But I think that communicating um this research and having it accessible to the wider public, I think that's something that I hope to do within my work. But also I think to kind of eradicate misconceptions within female women's health. So for example, within PMDD, many individuals such as healthcare professionals think that it's kind of just made up in your head and it's just kind of this thing that we experience and it's not a real thing but I think that communicating how these conditions are real and they're not just kind of a western culture bound syndrome I think that's something that I um strive to do within my work. How difficult have you found it, of, being able to communicate, which is neuroscience, is, as it says, quite heavy science-based things to sort of general public. Do you have particular approaches or would, yeah, what's your process in doing such things? I think I kind of like to dissect it in terms of what they are, m specifically kind of in terms of medical terminology, and then move on to symptoms and move on to research. But in terms of research, I'm clearly explaining key terms so that the general audience is able to understand them. But also in terms of I'm also including resources in my work. So there's a lot of podcasts that are available for the wider public that do explain certain terms and certain medical conditions in a good enough way that the general audience can access these and they are easy to understand. So I do always make sure to include podcasts within my work and kind of resources. there's a lot on online about so with PMDD, I found a lot on the mind website. So there's a lot of smaller clips, even if it's information leaflets, or even podcasts or even smaller videos that further explain what we're trying to research and what we're trying to explain to support our work. Yeah, so because I guess people learn in different ways, don't they? You can't just read, you need to see sometimes, you need to hear. Yeah, so you're of getting, you're kind of doing all different types of senses almost. So what you're saying is this just, it sounds like m there's just not enough. So with PMDD, there's not enough research, there's not enough learning to healthcare. I endometriosis is obviously a very hot topic at moment, which is coming up quite often. m What do you think? How do you think we can get better research and healthcare within women's research? That's a really wide topic. I'm asking this to both of you because I feel like this will open a can of worms. What can we do better? As in terms of the general public or in terms of us as neuroscientists. Okay. I think kind of um raising and opening up discussions about these conditions amongst blogs, amongst videos and amongst different platforms. So we do have blog content and we also produce videos in a smaller. um in a smaller section where we're able to explain em what certain conditions mean. And again, it's abolished common misconceptions that are within the media. I think that's a really big thing to m work that we're working with within women in neuroscience. So again, those kind of things where a lot of the time females are going to the GP and they're not. being, their feelings aren't being validated that their conditions are real and they're not just made up in their head. I think that's a huge thing. And in terms of the general public, if we're talking to individuals em such as sisters, mothers, friends, and kind of sharing their concerns and kind of sharing our own experiences, and when we're going to the GP, kind of pushing for as much as we can, m further help within our conditions. So for example, if we're going to the GP about certain conditions that we've experienced, kind of saying is there any information resources or leaflets that we can access online or that you're able to give me to give me a better understanding of my condition or better understanding of my symptoms. So I'm to not educate myself, also the people around me as well. Yeah, so like you're just constantly like sharing that message with everyone. And I guess as neuroscientists, that's maybe something we need to take on, you know, always like advocating for, you know, not just obviously the research that we're doing, but for like, you know, the kind of the larger kind of patient groups that it affects and yeah, that's, that's That's very like ground up, but I also think, I know you guys can give better opinions of it because I guess it's something which women in neuroscience UK does, but having sort of that leadership roles, sort of more sort of representation and leadership means that you probably will get those more grants or more sort of effective orders from the top to be able to do certain things. What are your opinions on that? Jenny, do you want to take this? Okay, yeah. So I would say like uh I think women in neuroscience has already done a lot in that direction and of course like we are a group of women but we are actually more than happy to have men in bold and it the change comes also in that where like the kind of feminist movement or feminist uh issues are not just from our side. uh So in terms of like leadership and uh of getting like this pace, I think like having a leadership position in uh in when UK really gave me also like the confidence to say, okay, I'm doing something I I can get these responsibilities, I can deal with all of this going on. uh And I'm sure it's also a big component of being a role model for people from the outside and see what a group of women could uh do and have done. uh Not sure if I'm answering the question. ah I think visibility is like a big factor. So when I was doing my PhD in New Zealand, I was the only brown person in that entire floor. And it kind of would have been nice to, you know, see somebody else. a lot. um So our previous guest on Elliot Okawa, she spoke a little bit about um sort of visibility because she's Maori from background and just having more people who like look like you, sound like you in a space can help. in terms of when you're sort of young and you're developing sort of things early on in your career. um I also really like the you said about that women in neuroscience, you say you also take male members as well? em Like, we don't put it as a restriction, so it's just not happening. Yeah, think that's actually just such an important point being like, you know, feminism does not stop with women. Feminism is everybody can be a feminist. So, you know, being like, I maybe have, although people will say not say this so much anymore, but I maybe have a voice that, you know, people subconsciously listen to more, maybe as a man. like by joining possibly like WiN UK, like there's rooms that we might not be able to get to where they can advocate and get more women in those spaces as well. em Yeah, that should be, yes, something, mean, here, get yourself into a member of WiN UK. sign up. Yeah, I'll do it after the pod. you Yeah. Calling them onto the podcast was the first step. But I think the m point that you made about visibility was really important because I think even myself, I was one of the only Asian individuals within my neuroscience class. And I think even at WiN UK, I don't think I've seen someone that looked like me within a similar position or doing the work that I'm doing. So I think taking that step to change the representation and change uh the representation amongst neuroscientists and amongst uh individuals within STEM, I think is really important also. Do you think that we need more more support is needed from up top or do you think you're getting that or what what do you more the neuroscience community could do more of? I think definitely more support from above, but I think that what we can do right now is we're doing as much as we can on our level and hopefully that should kind of have that domino effect in society and within our communities as well. Yeah. Do you think her mentorship programs are important? Yeah. definitely. I think especially when we've been through similar situations and we've experienced certain gender biases within our work and within our communities and I think if we're able to kind of support the younger generation throughout their university careers or throughout their careers entirely then I think that will be hugely beneficial for them and also for future generations to come. Absolutely. There's a big thing about being able to, you know, see yourself. I once had, I once knew somebody who got quite mad because they applied to be a mentor and they, it was a mentorship in London and it was for, it was for people who were, who were black and they were not. And they made a comment saying like, I'm being racist. I can't be a mentor because... I don't have the correct skin colour, but there could be lots of people who haven't experienced that. I don't have that person there. There might be a lot of people like me, further up, who I feel like, can see that person doing very well. That's fine. I can go to them. But there might not be a lot of people from other backgrounds, as you said, Riya, when you were doing your undergrad. And it's quite important to have that there. I remember just being a little bit taken aback by it, by these different types of privilege that people maybe just don't quite get. Especially when you're talking to individuals, they need to see you as relatable and they need to kind of see you as you've experienced similar things to them. So how can you give advice on things that you haven't experienced, I think. Yeah. Oh, I'm glad I opened that for Williams. That was good talk. um May I add something on that? uh Neuroscience is also a uh kind of special uh field because it mixes and takes a lot of um different faculties and different topics, uh which is also why I love neuroscience because you can actually do completely different things just because we're studying the brain. uh We are in this box of neuroscience. uh But in terms of like this, the representation, what we see is that at the lowest, like at the entry levels, we have way more women. This semester I only had girls in my class, which was amazing by the way. So because we also come, we have a lot of like psychology people coming. And so sometimes it's difficult. to um also uh demonstrate that this is problem. So we always see like the scissors effect and it becomes later a problem. But I've been also addressed like at my previous lab uh where basically there were only women, but the head of the department was a man. And he was like, I don't understand what are you complaining all about? Look around you. And I was like, yes, but. you're the lead in here. So you see that there is still a distance, like a difference. And in the University of it's special because it gets uh this really uh low level of people in higher hierarchy. No, I completely agree with that, that like, even in my labs, it's the lead was very rarely a woman, but like a lot of the people underneath were and like my teaching stuff, same thing. m Lots of girls, which is a good thing. There is an argument that that will take some of it will just be healed with time, because I guess a lot of the people who are in are younger oh or are earlier on in their careers and. A lot of people in the 70s and 60s were men who were doing this stuff, so they're the ones in leadership positions now. uh The argument is it's not coming fast enough, but some of it should be healed with time. Yeah, I think so. Well, let's use a good old glass ceiling effect. It's still here. yeah, surely. Like we are working on that, but like uh the index, uh the European Union, but I saw now that UK is also doing that. There's a really interesting lab doing this in King's College, I think. They're measuring the index uh every year. So, and there are a lot of like research on, so we have like a number for each country. uh measuring the gender uh difference in all the fields. uh And then there is the she figures every year uh coming uh also from the European Union uh following this scissor effect. So the gap is closing but it's not, as you mentioned, not at the right uh pace. So kind of too slow to really reach the goal that we are having at the moment. The differences between countries is quite interesting to me because I remember reading this for STEM, not necessarily for neuroscience, but sort of the disparities are least in Eastern European countries and Iran. And I'm like, OK, so we need to become communist Islamic republics to even everything out. was a joke, okay? But... know I know that like this paradox that northern countries and Scandinavian countries Even though they're like really pushing on on this topic. They're not yet succeeding in that and this is something like still trying to to to understand because there are policies ongoing in Scandinavian countries, but the results are not easy to reach because it's so rooted in in culture and Even if you're doing it in your own country, we're still in such a global environment that it is difficult to make the change if you're kind of alone. Do you think, so yeah, so I've kind of got this thing where it's like, how do we kind of raise profile of more kind of women getting into, know, kind of places of like, I guess, power within neuroscience and, just also with just women's health in general, I guess, like, how can we think by having women in those kinds of positions of power, we can have more research and more grants that are proposed for, you know, more research into this as most, I think is it most, a lot of them. So I'm also in uremagest, I used to a little bit of animal work, but I know a lot of animal work is a lot of time done on male mice, is that correct? Yeah. Yeah. the reason behind it as as an animal researcher, the reason the reason behind it or what was argued or what you see is because the ovulation cycles of mice and rats are about four days long. And so they tend to mess with the results. But ah your the exact opposite is then why don't you study it? That's more important to figure out than then. um Yeah, so my lab back in New Zealand didn't do that. We made it a point to study both sexes. And if the results were insignificant, they were insignificant, or whatever. But yeah, that's generally the argument, that they're more erratic, so it's just cheaper to just do it on the male mice in terms of funding. So there's an economic argument for it as well. But in all cases, yeah, you're right. I'm going to tell everyone a little bit something a bit shocking here. Not only do women mice ovulate, human women also ovulate. Shocking, shocking I know. Wow, that is quite the argument. I know it's not physical. I've heard some shocking ones because we had to justify it in our ethics approvals, right? For why we were doing this and how much money we're using it. So I've gone down the rabbit holes before. Yes. So do you think in general what we need to do is within research we need to have whenever we look at research we need to just look at sex difference as a whole or do think we need to completely just look more into women's health on its own? think a bit of both, think, really. So definitely kind of, especially when you're doing animal models, if you can use female models, please use them, especially when the conditions that you're researching have a high predisposition within females. I think that's a really frustrating thing also. em And especially, em there's definitely more research that needs to be done within females health, especially in terms of funding. That's a big issue within that also. um I will go a little like bigger. uh I think like the problem nowadays is that what we call evidence is um Just coming from like really narrow uh Kind of non-representative samples mainly men mainly white Mainly coming from like what are called like weird countries. So like Western educated uh Industrialized and democratic so like uh It is more like getting a bigger picture of what exactly is that mechanism throughout the whole population. And in this, we also get into like the sex differences and in women's health, uh but it's more like a big problem in research. So like the idea of like one side fits all, it's not. And we are doing that a little bit in trying to have this precision medicine, but we are still. running precision medicine studies in the same population as usual. And even with this big data, I use big data, I only had that, it was just my PhD research. uh And I used what I had. Then for example, a lot of those studies are, for example, in the UK, come from the biobank and amazing resource, but we know the limits of that population that it's a population that was selected and started. m being analyzed years and years ago so like it's good we have longitudinal study on that but we should like shift to another kind of population and have most a different like representative in science and and again so in this we need sex differences because we have and this is what equity and equality is the the change like if we use the same approach to everyone. This is equality. It's good. Okay. But we need equity because we don't need the same things. We need to like there is a uh really basic like letter uh schema to explain this difference. If you give like the same box to watch something on the other side of a fence, you are still not getting all the people looking at that. If we actually give the right amount, the right height uh of the box compared to the height of person that want to look after the fence, we get equity. this is where sometimes the of the pitfall of understanding that we don't have the same needs. And it's extremely difficult. I don't have any solution on that. Please don't ask. But uh I think we should look in that direction. Yeah, sounds like by just identifying is, you know, the biggest thing, you know, yeah, like I mentioned before, like, you know, some women have have endometriosis, that's probably not going to be something that affects, you know, other people. And so, you know, we have to kind of look at that. I think a big one thing that you just started to touch on was like, the biobank, you know, it's like a very big population, but what about different cultures, you know, if you We're to go to India or Africa. Are they going to have the same struggles as people who are maybe in England? Probably not. Some similar, some not. We have to look across like that's a point, which is just a very, very, very good point. em I think probably before I go too much into cultures, because we've had a couple of really good interesting podcasts on this recently, I guess maybe we could start to talk a little bit more about Win UK's mission a little bit more and kind of what they want to do. you want to do. Um, yeah. Go for it. I'm just focused. Just to start us off with, what is Wyn UK? Can you maybe just elaborate what the values are, what your mission is, m and why it's so important? So there's a few questions there, so I'll let you answer that at will. m So I would definitely say the mission that we have at WinUK. So again, a non-profit organisation that works to connect, inspire and advocate female identifying neuroscientists. think that's a really big thing. Throughout the content that we're producing, throughout the blogs that we're producing, throughout the workshops that we're hosting, the in-person events and the virtual events that we're hosting to bring together a group of like-minded female identifying neuroscientists to connect them together and then advocate for female m neuroscientists and their challenges that they've experienced, but also advocate for certain conditions that aren't widely spoken about, m that females have a higher predisposition for experiencing certain conditions. I think that's a really big thing also. Yeah, so we have this like nice motto, I would say that it's like to inspire, connect and advocate that really summarizes well our mission. And it has like the purpose is to tackle sexism and gender bias and for a more like inclusive and innovative neuroscience. um Everything started in 2022 by Litzy English that we all thank for existing and doing that. em She started from like a personal story because she was feeling what we mentioned before that like she was looking around and was like, am I the only one in here? uh And then, I don't know, she was, I need to do something. And she started really small. We got think like a webpage and uh some social media and uh she definitely like reached. uh out of the UK because I was not based in the UK at all. uh She started kind of small but in the end she reached uh out of the country. So we are now like uh a big volunteer group. uh It depends, like I think we reach at some point even 70 people on the group. And we have all different, of course it's a volunteer organization for now. I'm always like... let's do more but with time. And so of course people kind of collaborate and work on different levels. uh But yeah, are getting like a lot, we are achieving a lot of goals slowly and really proud. Yeah, it sounds like it needs to be Win International at this point. Hahaha This was my initial goal, but I actually started understanding the role of having local organization. Because dreaming big is good, but you also need someone that is local, that is there, and sometimes getting big events is not needed. You really need to feel closure. So I changed my mind. Yes, because I feel like sometimes when you're... When you're at a too big of an event, it's very difficult to connect. But if there's like 20 or 30 people within a group, it feels a little bit more intimate, a bit more personal. You're going through a similar journey and then it can always build from there, I guess, can't it? I mean, it looks like it's getting bigger. have followed you guys on social media and I saw you guys had an award ceremony a few days ago, weeks ago now. So, yeah, so on the 7th of November we had a Winn UK Awards in King's College London. So that turnout was really, really good. And so last year we had it at the University of Cambridge in the chemistry department. This year was a lot bigger than normal. So we're kind of upscaling a bit more each year. So it's really nice to see. And this year a lot of individuals had met each other previously. So it wasn't that kind of awkward, fast, 10, 15 minutes. So they were kind of talking to each other. They helped kind of formed individual groups, it was really lovely and there was so many lovely individuals, both female identifying neuroscientists and their allies present there, which was really, really nice to see. Yeah, Kate Slade was one of the nominees, one of our great, great friends, friend of the show. she's a great individual. She came on a few weeks ago. Yeah. She's lovely. did, we planned an event together a few months ago now for the British Neuroscience Association. She's great. I won't go on, but she is great. I really like it. So you spoke kind of a little bit about you've had some kind of maybe like kind of recent kind of wins almost. Can you maybe talk about some things that you've kind of, the goals that you've... achieved recently and what kind of visions for the future almost. Jenny, do you want to start? in terms of when you k or like personally in when you pay Do you know what? Yeah, both. I feel like there's two stories to this. Both, please. um So generally as when you K um As mentioned we are like kind of getting bigger, but it's not only that I think when you started having like partnership and Sponsorship department like team then you feel that you're doing something bigger I for me it was that kind of click. Okay, we're we're getting support from other organizations. We actually, think we got it from the very beginning. One of the few, I was not even there. I think one of the first um events was some kind of like neuroscience, women in neuroscience uh organization from Georgia. So like, I think we always got this kind of support from the outside, but getting the proper um kind of being asked to, for example, when last year I was also there uh at a conference, we were kind of asked to have our stall and have a lunchtime session. And when you are invited and you're not like proposing in first place, I think it is the way you see that you are getting bigger or you're doing something that is meaningful and resonates with others. uh And it is also like kind of a challenge because then you get to a different audience than what you're used to. I remember we got a few questions and Lizzy was really worried about a few comments that she received and then actually the same person, then we found out that she had, um I think it was a podcast or like an interview and they said like the best... um conference, like lunchtime session I ever had and my favorite part of the conference was that one and we were really like worried because they actually had a kind of comments or like yeah, they were like uh not criticizing but actually was like pure curiosity but we thought it was not matching. So I think like when you get into a bigger crowd and and you do something different and then you really see what can be the impact. And in terms of myself, I started really early, so I joined WinnUK in 2022 when it was really different from what it is now. And what attracted me of WinnUK is exactly the fact that it kind of still looks at the kind of in kind of like the young generation of neuroscientists. So other organizations exist and we have world women in neuroscience, we have uh other groups, but the approach that Wyn UK has is really kind of like appealing to the undergrads and or like PhDs without excluding older. generation or uh scientists. I think that this is the way that the WinUK approach helped a lot in expanding. uh And we tried, from my point of view, with the help of the social team, we tried to do it with some kind of uh colorful graphics and infographics that can also uh be informative. oh So it's kind of a world brand that we're trying to have. Yeah, being very inclusive by the sounds of it. So everyone doesn't feel like they can, you know, learn and join if they want to. And they have no barriers to doing that, which is very important. And so you've spoke a little bit briefly about maybe getting some like, I know in this case, it was perceived to maybe negative kind of feedback. Has there been many difficulties? I know sometimes within kind of when you start a kind of groups, can be negative feedback. And if so, How do you deal with that? How do you tackle that? I think, honestly, we rarely receive negative feedbacks uh because I think this is the whole point of uh our organization. But still, we face rejections and we applied to many grants, uh really super convinced that they were going through because we see the urge and we see that it is a problem. So of course, when it's your stuff, you're like, it is important. How can you not realize that we're trying to do something uh for the scientific community and for this field and so on? So I think there were a few times where we got grants rejected, where we were like, OK, maybe it's not exactly. Maybe we're not kind of touching on the right uh things. uh And that maybe could have been a little difficult, but overall we receive really positive uh comments when we have our events. uh sometimes it's also like another thing, maybe sometimes with our virtual events, we got really few people attending and that could also be a little, because there is a lot of effort in even with us. with the virtual events, like with webinars. uh And also in that, think that was kind of a flag that was like around like, okay, maybe we're not doing promo enough or whatever. But people that attended were still super positive. it is always like, uh you take the pros and cons of every experience and you learn from that. So The incredible thing is you guys are growing. guys like the award ceremony, for example, what you said that from the first year to the second year and across three years, you you're getting more grants accepted. People are asking you to come on things now like we did. We asked you to come here. um But you also mentioned that you realize the importance of organizations like yours being local or focusing on sort of like staying within the UK to an extent. So I was just wondering what your guys' vision is for the future, how you guys plan on growing. Is there a sort of upper limit of what you guys want to reach or... Yeah. Yeah, currently there's no upper limit at the moment, but I think that slowly increasing our sponsorships, our partnerships within the UK and m internationally. So we also had an organisation, The Transmitter News, m they m sponsored our WinUK awards this year. So a representative from America flew em to attend the awards to present an award there. So again, smaller m improvements and smaller widen our reach in smaller positions. think that's the way that we're working from now on. But I think that from the years onwards, so for 2026, 2027, it's again to have that small increase in our reach and also our partnerships and the work that we're doing as well. Yes, I think like, I don't think we have in mind to go like internationally or globally. um But uh the fact that we had sponsor from outside of UK for the first time, it's already a good sign. uh I think like, with our like social media and virtual events, uh we are trying to reach out of the UK. We are also trying to adjust like the time so that it is kind of easy to follow from wherever. ah But what is the goal in terms of in-person event is to go around the UK. So like we started from like Cambridge because we had connections, London, of course, it's always like an easy location because it's easy to reach. But there are many universities all over the country. So we're doing our WinUK Day. uh we're trying. I'm not sure if we found a venue, so if you have a venue let me know. This is the goal for now, to just go locally in different realities and cities in the UK. Beth is a big name at University of Liverpool, I'm sure she could organize something for you. a really overreach, but thank you. I am a researcher here, nothing wild. here just likes to big me up. Sorry, go on, Ria. of working with uh university neuroscience society. So we've done a lot of workshops with various university society. So even kind of smaller ones. So at the University of Birmingham, we had like, I think it was like a tea and, tea and I don't know what was it? Yeah, tea and talk about what we're doing at women neuroscience and kind of aiming towards, was it, I think again, early career researchers? So again, kind of more informal discussions about raising awareness of the work that we're doing at Women in Neuroscience across m universities m within the UK, I think. m So you've been to kind of multiple, so which university was that Birmingham did you say? Yes, Birmingham, yeah. Yeah. want to go around and do that at lots of different universities, have a little tea and talks, like to kind of, as we spoke about earlier, like, spreading the word. Yeah, so think Lizzie's done a lot of gender bias workshops across different universities across the UK. So we've done Plymouth. I can't think of anything more Plymouth. I'm sure there's definitely been something done at Cambridge. Can you think of anything more, Zinni? Yeah, Nottingham. We had Win UK Day last year, which the turnout was really, really good. Yeah, PhD. Yeah, yeah. then Liverpool, we were there because we had two conferences like in 2020, three and four, think something like that, oh, four and five. And Oxford, but yeah, it's still like, I don't know, I think we want to go a little outside of like the usual core areas of research. But yeah. Come up here to Glasgow. We do have some volunteers in Scotland also, yeah. So a curse, Yeah. maybe. I believe the BNA next one is also going to be in Belfast. Yeah, so yeah, Belfast. Yeah, time to go across the water, not just to the east, but also to the west. So I think it's going be a good time for me to kind of like, there's a question I'd like to ask and I'll put it to both of you, but I'll maybe be bordering it a little bit. So I want to pretend that you've been given two billion pounds, you know, the biggest grant of them all. And let's say you want to run a study or an event. So the ethics board have all gone on holiday for a week. No such thing as ethics. You can do whatever you want. What would be your kind of dream, either study to run or event to run? And tell me about it a little bit. Jenny, you want to go first? Yeah. would have different ones, so you guys can each go. Yeah, so in terms of like research projects, ah again, I stress like unlimited resources and no ethical issue. Again, my goal is always to prevent. I would, I love I'm fascinated by translation research, never did at all. uh But um I think we can really learn doing like both directions. uh So I would love to kind of map the psychological changes that happen at the level of both like hormones or like uh brain, but uh even just like at the level of the the blood that can easily collected to check like biomarker of abuse and maltreatment and uh try to like kind of create uh a tool that can be used to flag uh people that are like in probably like in danger or like that already in difficult situations uh that can be used for getting help uh without kind of like disclosure of that which is the problem I think adequately but having like kind of a signature of abuse and maltreatment getting from the blood that GPs or like first aid can can check and then act as a consequence would be great. But again, I think like it's just the the ideal thing that I would love to work on uh moving on. That's really interesting. think from memory, there's somebody at King's College London who's sort of looking at blood biomarkers for things like depression and anxiety to try to see that if you could just test blood, you can detect these things. I don't know how well it's going, but I remember the project being up there a couple of years ago. Yeah, there is a lot like at the level of epigenetics. I'm sure there is like a group in Milan doing that. uh But yeah, I think like it's a long process to then really find research about it and then move on into using it as a routine screening tool. But yeah. I mean, that actually brings up a question which I had for Riya at the very start, but we didn't actually get to it, was because you work and want to work with third sector organizations. of that. oh What do you think researchers can do better in terms of working with such organizations? Because I feel a lot of disconnect actually happens between the research and applying things in the real world. So somebody who doesn't work in the research phase, it'd be a good thing to hear about your opinions on that. Yeah, sorry, my wifi keeps cutting out. I'm on my data at the moment, but it's just so bad. But I'll try and answer what I heard. So I definitely think that if we're able to kind of link that gap between research and the third sector, so medical charities in terms of the correct information is being... displayed on websites and em on information resources uh online that is up to date and is for a lay audience. think that's the most important thing. And also again, utilizing social media platforms to display this research, that's the most updated and that is correct and again, is accessible for all individuals. I think that's the main thing. And I think it's something which we do really poorly at universities. Our social media game is shocking. I think that's the easiest way to just kind of reach. And I think also within social media, there's so much fake news, especially medically amongst social media. And I think if we're able to have medical charities or even the third sector at all producing videos or producing content that is accurate and that is easy to understand. I think that's the best way forward, I think. Nice. On that side, another thing that I would definitely do, especially in the health, like neuroscience but generally health, uh people in research should know uh or at least have an experience with patients to understand what are they studying uh because it was also my case. I have a lot of data, it was there, I didn't even touch or met any. like human being that I was actually studying. And this is kind of like a little alienating from what you do. Maybe it also happens with animal models, then you're like, even you're setting a completely different organism. So you are kind of separated from what is the final goal. So like to find a cure for that kind of patient for the people. So a little bit more on that. we also tried to do it. In our last webinar, it was really important for me to have a patient talking about the real experience of being a woman in pain. uh It is simple sometimes. It happens at conferences, but as you see, people are just not attending that session because they think like it's not what I'm researching. Like I have this animal model of this and that, so I'm going to the panel to and totally ignore the story of patients. That is another thing that I felt it was lacking in my experience, but I also feel that it gets you into what is the final goal and building something that is meaningful and useful for the patient at the end of the uh story, like of the research that is the final thing. And I think working closely with these medical charities and having researchers present within patient focus groups, so for example discussing in the way that how can we tailor upcoming research to the needs and the challenges of patients within that specific area, I think that's really important also. Yep, yep, yep. Patient voices are incredibly important. The full picture of what's going on isn't one-sided just for research. It's all these little bits connected together. em want to ask Riya the two billion question and then we can wrap up? yes, do you have an answer for the two billion? Yes, so was very similar to em Ginny's actually. So in terms of using biomarkers em to test for specific things, but mine was mainly em to do with the menstrual cycle and how we can kind of use that as a diagnostic tool for many other conditions. So for example, I know that, em I don't know if it's very common within healthcare, I don't think that it is, but kind of symptom tracking. So for example, women that experience extreme symptoms. So for example, high amounts of pain, PMS symptoms, or even high amounts of bleeding or absences within their period. If we're able to symptom track their symptoms throughout their menstrual cycle in terms of how they correlate to increases or decreases in certain hormones, what does this mean? And how em can we use this to diagnose specific conditions, such as in chronic conditions like endometriosis, PCOS, chronic stress, for example? But also, so I think I was researching last night, m the FDA has approved a m test using menstrual blood. So testing for biomarkers in menstrual blood. m So I think they've done something to m do with diagnosing a test for diabetes, looking at, I think, a hemoglobin A1C maybe. m So that's just been approved. But even if we're able to look at the biomarkers within menstrual blood, again, for inflammatory markers, to further support how we're able to diagnose m chronic conditions like PCOS, like endometriosis, like chronic stress. For example, that would be really interesting. Yeah, funded, both of you, four billion done. Yeah, really fast. You're right, not like, you just don't hear a lot about it. And yeah, would also be like, you'd want it to be like, yeah, like a massive study and like, that's across the world. Yeah, I think two billion could fund that. I had asked you guys oh on the email if you guys to have like hot takes or things like that, did you guys prepare see them? yeah. think I saw... Yeah, Jenny, you wanna go first? But do you want do you want to ask him both? Yeah, Ginny, what is your research hot take? My hot take is that there is no such universal mechanisms and the one-size-fits-all doesn't really exist in neuroscience. um Briefly, if I need to explain that, that currently we have research ongoing and the evidence that has been produced is basically coming from um just a narrow of non-representative samples. um So we have mainly uh male, rich, uh white, mostly coming from Western educated uh countries. uh And that is just not the case of the world population. So until we don't make science representative, uh we just... don't really find the right treatments and the right solution to most of our problems. Very nice. And Riya, what is your hot take about your field? So obviously I'm not specifically in research but I would like to talk about my interests so again female health. So my hot take would be um that it's not all in your head and specific conditions that you are feeling and specific symptoms that you are feeling they're not this Western culture bound syndrome that you're experiencing and I guarantee you that so many women are experiencing a similar thing they're just not widely spoken about within mainstream media. so that you feel like it's made up but it's not. promise your feelings are valid and you're not crazy at all. with it. Brilliant. I think there's a good notes to end on as well that everything is in generalizable and Can I have one question? I think I might be able to get on. So for listeners who might want to support or get involved with WinUK, what would you tell them and what's the entry point as well? As we mentioned before, everyone is welcome and we are always in need. So feel free to reach out if you're interested. Just even email us or any social media message works well. We usually have recruitment rounds on need, but honestly, maybe it's every quarter or something. So maybe you just we just finished one. So In a few months, I think maybe there's going to be a new one. uh Currently, we are looking for an advisory board, like we're building an advisory board. So also everyone is welcome to join in there. We are looking for and seeking for different expertise, especially if are a little outside of neuroscience because ah we need some uh expertise also on practical things. had... I don't know, legal issues or like event organizations, everything is needed. And yeah, and if you cannot just try to follow us on social media, try to like share, comment and um yeah, participate. Another thing would be, so we're always looking for, oh sorry Bethany, we're always looking for, we're always looking for guest blog writers. So we release monthly prompts on our em writer slack. So I'm not sure how to, how do you join that? Do you know, Eddini? On the website you can just contact the blog team um via mail and then you're gonna be added to the Slack channel. um So there's monthly prompts released, but also if there's anything that you're really passionate about writing, if you were able to email the blog team and they're more than happy to sort something out for you. And on the social media side, we're always looking for individuals to share day in the life content. So something that's kind of quirky and very different to your normal kind of lab life, anything that's weird and wonderful, we're kind of open to creating content. em on your day in the lives and kind of sharing it on our social medias and anything content related, we're more than happy to kind of collaborate with you and m share across our social media and so on. Brilliant. I will make sure all the social media handles are like in the description of the videos and things as well for women in near sense, you case. So they're all there. ah Yeah, I guess on that note, thank you, via and Jenny for joining. It's been fantastic having you on. Thank you so much. Nice doing YouTube. was lovely to meet you all and thank you everybody for listening. um I know once you go follow Women in Newer Science UK and remember to give us a like and subscribe as well before that doing that. And yeah, until next time, take care. Bye. Bye.