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News from ICTP 115 - Profile
ICTP Senior Associate Zohra Ben Lakhdar has spent a lifetime lighting the way for others.
Lighting the Way
We are all products of our time,
shaped by the events that surround us.
But few of us ever have an opportunity to serve as shining symbols
of our time, reflecting through our own life experience larger
trends within our societies.
Zohra Ben Lakhdar, director of the Laboratory of Atomic-Molecular
Spectroscopy and Applications at the University of Tunis and ICTP
Associate (2001-present), is one such person.
Raised in Tunisia in the early 1950s, at a time when efforts to
educate women were considered misguided, she has methodically
navigated the obstacles she faced as a woman from a poor country
in North Africa to gain international recognition in the field
of laser physics.
Last year, Ben Lakhdar, in recognition of her pioneering life-long
contributions, was awarded the l'Oréal-UNESCO Award for
Women in Science for furthering the "development of optics
and photonics as a scientific discipline in Tunisia and all of
Africa," and "making a number of contributions to optical
science and its applications."
"When I was young," says Ben Lakhdar, who has visited
ICTP at least once a year for the past 10 years both to attend
the Centre's laser workshops and, more recently, to conduct research
as an ICTP Associate, "everyone around me said that science
was for men. They assumed the role of women was to take care of
the family."
Even at a young age, Ben Lakhdar was determined to prove this
prevailing attitude wrong. In 1956, before she reached the age
of 13, she became only one of two girls to graduate from a primary
school in the nearby town of Jemmal.
Her education would have likely ended there---the nearest secondary
school, after all, was located in the town of Sousse, more than
20 kilometres away. But following Tunisia's independence from
France in 1956, her parents decided to move to the capital city
of Tunis, where she enrolled in a secondary school concentrating
on French and Arabic studies. "Science, my first love,"
Lakhdar explains, "was barely a part of the curriculum."
Tunisia's new constitution provided equal rights to women and
Ben Lakhdar took advantage of this welcomed reform measure to
enrol in Sadiki College in 1962, a men's school that was strong
in physics and mathematics but weak in efforts to provide gender
balance. She would be awarded her degree in 1963.
Next stop along her long road to academic success came at Tunis
University, then just a three-year-old institution, where she
received a fellowship to study in the faculty of science. At the
time, of the 200 students enrolled in the science faculty, only
five were women.
In 1967, her good grades led to another step in her career development
when Ben Lakhdar was selected to attend the Université
Pierre et Marie Curie (Paris VI) to earn a diploma d'études
approfondies. The university, Ben Lakhdar recalls, was home
to an atomic spectroscopy laboratory, which helped to "open
a new world of science for me---a world of atoms and stars and
cells." It was also a world where she came in contact with
world-class scientists, including Nobel Laureates Claude Cohen-Tannoudji
and Alfred Kastler.
She would be awarded her advanced degree at Paris VI in 1978,
successfully completing a dissertation on the use of spectral
analysis for determining how different atoms interact with one
another.
Despite being offered an opportunity to remain in Paris, Ben Lakhdar
decided to return to Tunis University so that she could help to
provide students in her own country with the same opportunities
that she had enjoyed in France.
The task would not be easy. Computers had to be acquired, software
purchased, and administrators convinced that not only was her
research worth doing but that a woman was capable of doing it.
Because expensive laboratory equipment was beyond the university's
budget, Ben Lakhdar turned to theoretical studies, exploring advanced
spectroscopic methods for examining the interaction of atoms and
molecules. Her specific research interest lied in applying this
knowledge to the detection of air- and water-borne pollutants.
It would take her 10 years to publish her first paper.
"ICTP has proven instrumental in helping me continue my career,"
she says. "My visits to Trieste have allowed me to keep current
in the field and to exchange ideas with colleagues around the
world. I am particularly grateful to Gallieno Denardo. His efforts,
through the Office of External Activities (OEA), have not only
boosted my research but have given me an opportunity to develop
contacts with scientists across Africa via OEA's Laser, Atomic
and Molecular (LAM) network."
"People often think that personal willpower and determination
have allowed me to succeed. But having help from friends, like
those at ICTP, has made a big difference. The truth is that I
couldn't have done it without them."