Asia | Japan | Culture

Women outperform men after Japan medical school stops rigging exam scores

Women have outperformed their male counterparts in entrance examinations for a medical school in Japan that last year admitted rigging admission procedures to give men an unfair advantage. Juntendo University in Tokyo said that of the 1,679 women who took its medical school entrance exam earlier this year, 139, or 8.28%, had passed. The pass rate among 2,202 male candidates was 7.72%. It was the first time in seven years that the pass rate among women was higher than among men, the Asahi Shimbun reported. The university attributed the exam results to its decision to “abolish the u

Asia | Kyrgyzstan | Career

Kyrgyzstan’s space women blast off from male dominance

Source: Aljazeera

Having grown up in one of the poorest and most conservative regions in Kyrgyzstan, 17-year-old Begaiym Isaakova never imagined she would work in tech, let alone be part of a team of young women building the country's first spacecraft. By age 15, Isaakova was shocked to see her peers in Jalal-Abad being married off, but not too surprised. The message that girls should prioritise knowing how to serve men started early and was everywhere, including in schools and homes. Instead of being sent down the aisle in a country where early and forced marriage - including by bride kidnap - is common

Asia | China | Science

Budding Women Scientists Selected for China’s Academic High-fliers Scheme

Source: Women of China

Two young female scholars have been shortlisted for China's ambitious scheme to sponsor its most promising scientists, the Thousand Talents Plan, according to a recent announcement by organizers. Liu Mingzhen and Yang Shu, both born in 1990, will each be granted their own scientific research facilities, a living allowance of 500,000 yuan (U.S. $77,000), and a scientific research fund of 1-3 million yuan (U.S. $150,000-300,000) over the next three years.

Asia | China | Science

Chinese Woman Scientist Appointed ABA President

Source: WomenofChina

The Asian Biophysics Association (ABA), a scientific organization that promotes biophysics research and education in the region, has appointed its first ever female president, it was announced on May 10. The new president, Yan Xiyun, is professor of the Institute of Biophysics under the Chinese Academy of Sciences. The announcement came whilst she was presiding over the 9th ABA Symposium, the largest-scale biophysics conference in Asia-Pacific region. The post will last for three years. Yan is a specialist in nanobiology, and has counted many achievements and fruits in scientific discove

Asia | Japan | Science

Why Japan’s Longest-Lived Women Hold the Key to Better Health

Source: Huffington Post

It took me two days to convince Gozei Shinzato to show me her arsenal of longevity supplements, but, in the end, she delivered. Before me lay at least five compounds that could explain how the spry centenarian had eluded the diseases of aging to reach her 104th year with the flexibility of a yogi and the frenetic energy of a Chihuahua. She showed me one supercharged supplement that fights breast cancer by reducing blood estrogen; a proven antimalarial agent that she uses to keep her stomach healthy; and another supplement that has been shown to help regulate metabolism, maintain low blood p

Asia | Japan | Culture

Japanese City Will Pay for Women to Freeze Their Eggs

Source: Good Magazine

Late last month, the city of Urayasu, in Japan’s Chiba Prefecture, decided to one-up the nation’s public medical insurance scheme by offering to subsidize egg freezing for local women. Dubbed the Urayasu Oocyte Cryopreservation Program, the plan is an apparent global first by any municipality. The local government has promised to allocate 90 million yen (about $750,000) to the local Juntendo University Hospital to promote research on the process, which involves encouraging local women to utilize the procedure. Normally, including 10 years of storage, egg freezing costs about a million yen