Canan Dağdeviren, an associate professor at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) in the United States, has been selected for the BBC's 2023 list of inspiring 100 women.
As a notable scientist and inventor, Dağdeviren has created a wearable "electronic bra" for the early detection of breast cancer using ultrasound.
Inspired by her aunt, who underwent regular cancer screenings but was diagnosed with advanced breast cancer and passed away six months later, Dağdeviren's invention holds vital importance for individuals at high risk of breast cancer.
Which women from Turkey have been on the list before?
Prof. Dr. Zehra Sayers was the first Turkish woman to be featured in the "BBC 100 Women 2019" list. The second woman from Turkey to enter the list was Gülsüm Kav, the General Coordinator of the Stop Femicides Platform, last year.
In 2021, the literary author Elif Şafak also made it to the list from Turkey. Şafak published her first novel, "Pinhan," in 1997. With her novel "Aşk" published in 2009, she became the author of the fastest-selling literary work in Turkish literary history. Şafak's books have been translated into more than thirty languages.
Abour BBC 100 Women
The BBC 100 Women list features 100 influential and inspiring women worldwide every year.
Launched as a series in 2013, the project focuses on putting women at the center by highlighting documentaries, features, reviews, and interviews about their lives.
In the "BBC 2018 100 Women" list, it included writer Isabel Allende from Peru, photographer and activist Boushra Yahya Almutawakel from Yemen, and academic Leyla Belyalova from Uzbekistan.
The "BBC 2019 100 Women" list featured ballerina Precious Adams, Greta Thunberg, and Sara Wesslin.
About Canan Dağdeviren
Physicist. The inventor of the wearable heart pacemaker.
Included in Forbes magazine's '30 Under 30 Scientists' list. Her interest in physics began at the age of 5 when he read a book about Marie Curie, a gift from his father. As she grew up, she created tools inspired by Pierre Curie's discovery of piezoelectricity.
After completing elementary and middle school, she attended high school in Kocaeli. Due to the damage caused by the 1999 earthquake, she was sent as a guest student to Adana Seyhan ÇEAŞ Anatolian High School. She then graduated from Hacettepe University with a degree in Physics Engineering in 2007. In Istanbul, she completed her master's degree in Material Science and Engineering at Sabancı University on a full scholarship in 2009.
In 2009, she won a Fulbright scholarship and started her doctoral studies in Material Science and Engineering at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign (UIUC), a state university in Illinois, USA. During her doctoral studies, she worked on flexible and foldable electronic devices covering the scope of physics, electronics, and chemistry, which can be attached/worn on the body and on the skin.
She is one of the young talents in Turkey's scientific community. She has the privilege of simultaneously managing projects at two of the world's best universities. She continues her work at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) Koch Laboratory. She also holds a young academy membership at Harvard University.
Gaining recognition as an important figure in the world of medical technology before turning 30, she made inventions inspired by illnesses experienced by family members to ease the lives of cancer and heart patients. When she learned of her grandfather's death due to heart failure at the age of 28, she vowed to do something for heart patients by the time she turned 28.
And using Piezoelectric devices, she invented a wearable heart pacemaker that can be attached to the heart and convert the heart's beating energy into electrical energy. The foundation of the devices she designed is based on physicist Pierre Curie's discovery of piezoelectricity. She first designed a wearable heart pacemaker, followed by a device for diagnosing skin cancer.
She has 12 papers, 2 patents, and more than 25 national and international awards. Born on May 4, 1985, in Istanbul, Üsküdar, she is the first child of an Adana-born mother and a father from Sivas.
(EMK/PE)
