Women in Research Week 2025

With support from the Equality, Diversity, and Inclusion Committee (EDI) of Trinity, the Dean of Research of Trinity, and the Trinity Long Room Hub, PhD researcher Morgiane Noel is launching this platform for women from diverse backgrounds to connect and share their research at Trinity.

This event will showcase women with impactful ideas and groundbreaking research, giving recognition to their portraits and projects while also introducing the individuals behind the research conducted at Trinity. Women in Research Week 2025 will focus on gender-based research, women in global South scholarship, women with disabilities, women from diverse cultural backgrounds, women in resistance, both in Ireland and globally, and more. To ensure inclusivity and accessibility, the event features a variety of platforms to disseminate women’s research, including researchMATTERS, portrait screenings, talks, and networking sessions.

Throughout the week, over 40 participants will have the opportunity to meet, collaborate, and share their research with a diverse audience. Attendees will engage with their work through discussions, networking sessions, and mentoring opportunities, connecting early-career researchers with accomplished senior researchers.
The week will be opened by the Dean of Research, Prof. Sinéad Ryan at the Trinity Long Room Hub, while the main event will take place on Thursday, March 6th, at the Trinity Long Room Hub. At the end of the week, the organisers will share the highlights with the Equality Office and the Dean of Research to promote further improvements in fostering inclusion at our college.

To celebrate Women in Research Week, researchMATTERS is highlighting a number of the participants and their current projects which you can read more about below.

Morgiane Noel, Ph.D. researcher, Founder of Women in Research Week

I am Morgiane Noel, founder of Women in Research Week at Trinity College Dublin. With support from Trinity’s EDI Committee, the Dean of Research, and TCD Long Room Hub, I am proud to launch this platform for women to connect, share their research, and inspire one another.
I am a Ph.D. candidate in Law (since 2022), researching European and International Human Rights, Migration and Climate Change. I hold an LLB (Belgian Law and EU Law), a two-year master’s from the Catholic University of Louvain (EU studies), an Erasmus master's from the University of Geneva (Global Studies Institute) , and an LLM in European and International Business Law from Trinity College. Additionally, I earned certificates in Humanitarian Law (College of Europe) and Teaching in Higher Education (Harvard School of Education).

I have three years of experience as a Teaching Assistant in Law and Political Science at Trinity College Dublin, where I also served as Head of Teaching Assistants. Currently, I lecture at Dublin City University and am a Scholar for Ireland (Trinity Access Programme). At the same time as my Ph.D, I act as a European Advocate for Climate Europe, engaging with the EU Council and European Commission on human rights, climate justice, and policy.

Previously, I worked as a Legal Officer in corporate and immigration law firms in Dublin and Luxembourg, and worked in a European insurance institution in the EU quarter, handling non-EU risks in sensitive regions. My advocacy includes co-leading the 2021 “Period Products” campaign for asylum-seeking women in Direct Provision in Ireland and launching a 2023 social justice initiative for education access. I have organized academic events and collaborated with organizations and institutions such as IOM Ireland and Embassies (Embassy of Algeria, etc). I am an Emerging Scholar at the Kaldor Centre for Refugee Law. As an Early Career Researcher at the Trinity Long Room Hub last year, I will continue my research as a visiting scholar at the European University Institute (April 2025) and the University of Oxford (Trinity Term 2025).

Maryam Yabo, Ph.D Researcher

Maryam is a third-year Ph.D researcher in the School of Law at Trinity College Dublin, specialising in climate justice. Her research adopts a Third World Approaches to International Law (TWAIL) lens to critically analyse the intersections of just transitions and resource extraction in the Global South, with a particular focus on cobalt mining in the Democratic Republic of Congo. She examines how the demand for green technology minerals risks perpetuating the same patterns of exploitation seen in the carbon economy while highlighting the importance of centring marginalised voices in global climate governance.

As a co-creator of Trinity College Dublin’s first mandatory sustainability module Maryam has been deeply involved in shaping interdisciplinary conversations about sustainability and equity. She also teaches various areas of global governance and international law and actively contributes to the Trinity Access Programme, supporting students from underrepresented backgrounds. Maryam’s work aims to decolonise prevailing narratives in climate justice, advocating for policies and practices that prioritize equity, accountability, and the lived experiences of communities most impacted by climate change.

Dr. Marzaioli Viviana, Assistant Professor

I am a research Assistant Professor in the School of Medicine in TCD. After completing B.Sc and M.Sc studies in Biotechnology in Italy, I moved to Ireland for my PhD journey in UCD. My international post-doctoral/research fellow experiences include positions in Germany, France, and Ireland, where I acquired an in-depth knowledge of innate immunity and inflammatory mechanisms in health and disease, specifically in rheumatic autoimmune diseases.

In 2022, I was awarded the highly competitive SFI-IRC pathways, paving way to establish my own research group as principal investigator, and to be appointed as Research Assistant Professor in the School of Medicine. My responsibilities include supervision, lecturing, and tutoring within the college, focusing my efforts to encourage the next generation of scientists into life science research.

My team works on understanding the role of innate immunity cells in the onset and progression of inflammatory rheumatic diseases, particularly Rheumatoid and Psoriatic arthritis. These diseases affect 1% of the worldwide population, (40,000 in Ireland), and impact predominantly the working population in their 3rd and 4th decade of life, with higher incidence and worst prognosis for women.

I have published multiple articles and received several national and international awards for my research, strongly contributing to the rheumatology field, with the overall goal to improve the quality of life of patients, while also educating and empowering them to better understand their disease.

Rana Alamri, Ph.D. Researcher

My name is Rana Alamri, and I am a law lecturer at a Saudi university. I hold a Master’s degree in Law from Dublin City University, where my thesis focused on Criminal Law and Human Rights. Currently, I am pursuing a PhD at Trinity College Dublin (School of Law), specialising in Public International Law and Human Rights.

My PhD thesis, titled “The Compatibility between Sharia Law and International Human Rights regarding Human Rights and Freedom of Expression,” explores the intersections between these two legal frameworks. In addition to my academic pursuits, I founded the Law Club at my university in Saudi Arabia to actively engage students through workshops, seminars, and other interactive activities. I have also participated in numerous legal seminars and conferences, further broadening my expertise and contributing to the legal field.

As a lecturer, I have taught various modules, including Criminal Law and Administrative Law, equipping students with both theoretical and practical legal knowledge. Beyond academia, I have provided legal advice to women on matters such as divorce and child custody in Saudi Arabia, reflecting my commitment to supporting women’s rights and empowering individuals within the legal system.

Sinziana Stanciu, Researcher

Researching the past often requires historians to go to the archives and seek out an answer a question. However, the archive is just part of an ongoing conversation that historians are having not only with one another, but with the past and what the remains are willing to tell us. This is one of the critical lessons I have learned in the past few years as I have gone to the archives to find answers to questions around nation building in Europe. Throughout my journey into the archives, I have repeatedly found women contributing to these pivotal political movements.

My research regarding women and their place in these transitionary periods of history happened almost incidentally. In working on my undergraduate thesis at Columbia, I began looking at the role that a specific family played in nation building for Romania in the late nineteenth century. However, when I went to the archives, I found a plethora of documents and sources from a specific family member, a woman, that was not covered as well in the historiography. This led me to writing my thesis on the development of her brand of nationalism that was influenced by contemporaneous political theories and the role of women in Romania’s future.

I brought this experience when I began to explore the French Revolution during my masters at Trinity. In my research I considered how two women were impacted by the Revolution as well as their writings during it. I found it imperative to figure the Revolution as a transformative part of these women’s lives and consider how their writing was shaped by it.

Their work is imperative to understanding both the shifting political landscape as well as the consequences of these changes on how women saw themselves. Throughout my undergraduate and graduate research, it is evident that women have played a role in the intellectual histories of Europe. I hope that my research will continue to tease out the role that women played as they considered big ideas such as liberty, nation building, and feminism in their writings. During my undergraduate degree I was a Trinity College Dublin Scholar in history and a Columbia University Global Thought Scholar.

Dr. Dilek Öztürk Yağcı, Postdoctoral researcher

Dr. Dilek Öztürk Yağcı is a postdoctoral researcher at Trinity College Dublin’s School of English and a research grantee from the Scientific and Technological Research Council of Turkiye (TÜBİTAK). Under the mentorship of Professor Chris Morash, she is conducting a year-long study on the spatial dynamics of contemporary Irish drama through the lens of human geography.

One central focus of her research is the examination of the Brian Friel Papers housed at the National Library of Ireland. Her forthcoming monograph, Re-Reading Brian Friel: Space, Place, and Text is scheduled to be published with Routledge in 2025 as part of their Studies in Irish Literature series. This will be the first book in Brian Friel scholarship to bridge archival materials with contemporary human geography and theories of space and place.

Dr. Öztürk Yağcı is also a lecturer at Istanbul Technical University, School of Foreign Languages. She earned her B.A. in English from Ankara University, her M.A. in English Literature from Boğaziçi University with her thesis on narrative presence and storytelling in Samuel Beckett’s drama—and her Ph.D. from METU, where she examined the spatial dynamics in Brian Friel’s drama. She has previously held a research fellowship at Queen’s University Belfast, working with the Institute of Irish Studies and the Brian Friel Theatre. Her research interests include contemporary British and Irish literature, theatre and performance studies, ecocriticism, and studies of space, place, and environment.

Srimoyee Biswas, Ph.D researcher

Srimoyee Biswas is a 2nd year PhD candidate in the School of Social Work and Social Policy, Trinity College Dublin, Ireland. Her research is funded by the Government of Ireland International Education Scholarship and the Trinity Research Doctorate Award. She has previously completed her postgraduate studies at Jamia Milia Islamia, New Delhi and has worked with organisations such as UN Women, Tata Institute of Social Sciences and Centre for Policy Research during her postgraduate stint in India. Currently, her doctoral thesis looks into welfare research and specifically utilises the ‘social exclusion’ lens to study policies and marginalisation as a phenomenon.

She also represented Trinity College Dublin, as an observer in COP29 and has previously represented United Nations Women at G20 along with being a youth speaker at UNESCO. The aim of her research is to look into the ideas of intersections in South Asia and challenge the feminist discourse specifically by centring caste in her debates. Her research, specifically looks to question the predominant welfare policies in India and revisit the ground up experience utilising a critical caste theory which shape women's interactions in those spaces. The aim of the research is to question and dismantle oppressive structures and instead put lived experiences at the focal point of policy discourses.

Sae Kitamura, Visiting researcher

I am a visiting fellow at Trinity College Dublin and a Wikimedian in Residence at the Library of Trinity College Dublin. As a researcher, I am a Shakespearean and theatre historian. My current research project focuses on gender and public speaking in early modern Britain. Early modern British women were expected to remain quiet, and it was uncommon for them to speak in public spaces. However, professional actresses were given speaking roles on the Restoration stage, and female preachers began to emerge because of the rise of new religious groups, such as the Quakers and Baptists. Although these two streams of female public speakers have mostly been treated as separate social trends, my project endeavours to demonstrate that they were part of a single social trend that enabled women to speak in public spaces.

I am also involved in the Wikimedia movement. I have been active in multiple Wikimedia projects, especially Japanese Wikipedia, for 14 years. A Wikimedian in residence helps connect cultural institutions to the Wikimedia community. My job is to support the Library of Trinity College Dublin to improve Wikipedia and Wikimedia Commons using their materials and to enhance Japanese Wikipedia by translating and writing Japanese Wikipedia articles about Dublin and Ireland using the materials owned by the library.

Dr. Cuisle Forde, Associate Professor

My research focuses on physical activity and exercise for health. I have worked with various clinical populations, including those living with HIV, Hepatitis C, and cystic fibrosis. More  recently, I have embraced interdisciplinary collaborations and adopted a systems-based approach to investigate the intersections of health, transport, and AI. I have also applied this approach to related research areas such as the Healthy Campus movement and online education. I am passionate about my work and deeply value academic freedom, which allows me to steer my research toward meaningful, positive impact.

I am an Associate Professor in the Discipline of Physiotherapy in the School of Medicine. Additionally, I serve as the Director of Online Education within the School of Medicine. I value diverse academic achievements. For instance, I was invited to speak with Positive Now about my research on the metabolic benefits of exercise for individuals living with HIV. This informal gathering was particularly meaningful as it demonstrated the real-world impact of my work. More recently, I successfully led a project to develop and deliver an OpenCourse on adopting a systems-based approach to creating a healthy campus. Lastly, receiving TRDA funding to support my research on health and transport was an empowering milestone in my career.

Vicky Bouché, Ph.D Researcher

I am Vicky Bouché, a Ph.D. candidate deeply passionate about Second Language Acquisition (SLA) and the integration of technology in education. My academic journey began as a Modern Foreign Languages (MFL) secondary school teacher, where I cultivated a love for language learning and innovative teaching methodologies. Over time, this passion led me to explore how emerging technologies, particularly Generative AI, can enhance language acquisition and make learning more inclusive and adaptive.

Currently, I am pursuing my Ph.D. at Trinity College Dublin, where my research focuses on leveraging Generative AI feedback tools to support Second Language Acquisition. My work critically evaluates these tools' capabilities and limitations, aiming to bridge gaps between learners and educators while fostering cultural understanding and connection.

One of my most rewarding roles has been serving as a Lead Mentor with TeenTurn, a program focused on providing girls with hands-on experience in STEM through mentoring, project-based learning, and participation in science and technology competitions. Through this initiative, I promote diversity and inclusion by helping young women build technical skills, confidence, and aspirations for future careers in STEM fields.

Tara Kerins Aylmer, Ph.D. researcher

My name is Tara Kerins Aylmer. I am a first-generation college student. After achieving a Bachelor of Arts in Accounting and Law in TUS: Midlands I pursued my Masters in Intellectual Property Law and Information Technology Law in Trinity. I am now a first year PhD candidate in the School of Law, researching Regulation Theory and the Regulation of AI.

I am passionate about ensuring that technological innovations are used ethically and for the common good, rather than purely for profit or for malicious purposes. I am passionate about Data Protection, Cybersecurity Law, Artificial Intelligence Ethics and Regulation, and Social Media Regulation. I have been awarded a Trinity Research Doctorate Award Scholarship for the duration of my PhD as part of an interdisciplinary group project entitled ‘Health and Transport in the AI Era’. My journey has been difficult but rewarding, and I am proud to be in the position I am in today. I look forward to making an impact in the realm of regulating technology, and leaving the world a little better than I found it.