Mexico City, Aug 24 (EFE).– Mexico’s Silvia Torres-Peimbert is the first Latin American woman to serve as president of the International Astronomical Union, or IAU, thanks to her five-decade scientific career.

Torres-Peimbert, born in Mexico City in 1940, is only the second Latin American to lead the IAU – Argentina’s Jorge Sahade headed the organization from 1985 to 1988 – and the second female IAU president after France’s Catherine Cesarsky, who served from 2006 to 2009.

The post “demonstrates that the IAU is international,” Torres-Peimbert, who earned a doctorate in astronomy at the University of California at Berkeley, said

Of the approximately 40 presidents who have led the organization since it was founded in 1919, “there have been only two from Latin America,” Torres-Peimbert said.

“The international component is sought. Just like I am Mexican, the secretary-general is from Italy and the vice presidents are from Israel, Russia and India,” Torres-Peimbert, researcher emeritus at the Astronomy Institute of the National Autonomous University of Mexico, said.

The members of the new IAU board represent different areas of astronomy, such as the study of galaxies and stars, Torres-Peimbert said.

Torres-Peimbert’s research has focused on the chemical composition of breeding regions for stars and gases expelled by medium-sized stars in the Milky Way and other galaxies, along with measures of the primordial presence of helium.

Among the 13,200 IAU members from 74 countries, women have never surpassed 16 percent, Torres-Peimbert said.

“Historically, Mexico has not developed science, and we have a background of social inequality,” Torres-Peimbert said. “We need more science and culture to solve this problem, and that requires an effort by the government. We need to have more universities and, although the government does support science, that support is insufficient.”

The IAU post helps “to call attention to astronomy, so the young people realize that it’s possible to earn international respect through the work you do,” the astronomer said.

Torres-Peimbert assumed the IAU’s presidency on Aug. 14 at the organization’s conference in Honolulu, Hawaii, and will serve until 2018. EFE