HANOVER, N.H. (March 25, 2019) — Dr. Susan Taylor, a micrometeorite expert and civil engineer with the U.S. Army Engineer Research and Development Center’s Cold Regions Research and Engineering Laboratory, and Jackie Richter-Menge, Arctic sea ice authority and recently retired ERDC-CRREL researcher, served as keynote speakers during the laboratory’s Women’s History Month activities.
“The two brown-bag-forum events just about filled the ERDC-CRREL Café,” said Dr. Gina Paduano Ralph, the event coordinator and an ERDC-CRREL research ecologist. “Both Susan and Jackie are so well respected in their research communities — it was excellent to be able to have them share their experiences as women in engineering and science with our current staff; ERDC-CRREL holds the keys to unlocking the future of our polar regions.
“I’m pleased to say that the ERDC and CRREL are dedicated to recruiting more women. We already account for about more than 30% of ERDC’s workforce.”
Richter-Menge is a presidentially appointed commissioner of the United States Arctic Research Commission and is a co-editor of the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration’s annual “Arctic Report Card.” She also chairs the Science Steering Committee for the Submarine Arctic Science Program and is sea ice science team lead for the National Aeronautics and Space Administration’s IceBridge mission.
Dr. Taylor developed the first classification system for micrometeorites (a subset of cosmic dust) and found that particle textures are linked to atmospheric entry heating. She also discovered the first micrometeorites from the asteroid Vesta and has authored or co-authored more than 50 journal articles.