HOW WOMEN SCIENTISTS CAN ACCELERATE NATIONAL INNOVATION GOALS

Dr Heba El-Shimy, Assistant Professor (Data and AI), Mathematical and Computer Sciences, Heriot-Watt University Dubai

Healthy societies, institutions, or teams operate best when comprising a healthy balance between males and females. A landmark study by Boston Consulting Group (BCG) with the Technical University of Munich uncovered that companies with above-average gender diversity generated around 45% of their revenues from innovative products, compared to only 26% as innovative revenues for companies with below-average gender diversity. These findings are echoed in the scientific field. A 2025 study by Nature analyzing 3.7 million US patents revealed that inventing teams with higher participation of women are associated with increased novelty in patents. Research by the Massachusetts Institute of Technology confirms that teams with more women exhibit significantly higher collective intelligence and are more effective at solving difficult problems. These studies tell one clear story: that participation of women in innovative and scientific fields is not only desirable — it is a strategic national asset.

UAE Women In STEM

The UAE holds one of the world’s most striking gender profiles in STEM education. According to UNESCO data, 61% of graduates in STEM fields are Emirati women, surpassing the Arab world average of 57% and nearly doubling the global average of 35%. At government universities, 56% of graduates are women, and they represent over 80% of graduates in natural sciences, mathematics, and statistics.

These numbers have translated into accomplishments that have captured global attention. The Emirates Mars Mission — the Hope Probe — was developed by a team of scientists that was 80% women, selected based on merit. Noora Al Matrooshi became the first Arab woman to complete NASA astronaut training in 2024. The Chair of the UAE Space Agency and the mission’s Deputy Project Manager is a woman: H.E. Sarah Al Amiri. At Mohamed bin Zayed University of Artificial Intelligence (MBZUAI), female enrolment reached 28% within five years and continues to grow. Women’s talents are being recognised — this is not a mere future ambition, but a present reality.

Scientific Research As An Engine For National Strategy

The ‘We the UAE 2031’ vision sets ambitious goals: doubling GDP to AED 3 trillion, generating AED 800 billion in non-oil exports, and positioning the country as a global hub for innovation, artificial intelligence, and entrepreneurship. The UAE’s rise to the 30^th place in WIPO Global Innovation Index 2025 signals a steady pace towards achieving the UAE 2031 vision. Sustaining this ascent requires continued investment into human capital to produce research output, intellectual property, and commercial innovation at a pace matching the ambition. This is precisely where women scientists become indispensable.

Women scientists are already major contributors to the seven priority sectors identified in the UAE National Innovation Strategy: renewable energy, transport, education, health, technology, water, and space. UAE women scientists are research-active in climate science, sustainable materials, clean energy systems, AI-driven diagnostics in healthcare, and environmental monitoring — all crucial sciences that the national development commitments depend on.

Knowledge economies are built on the ability to generate, apply, and commercialize research locally — reducing the dependence on imported technologies and creating self-sustaining innovation ecosystems. When a researcher at UAEU develops patented computational methods for drug design, as Dr. Alya Arabi recently did with four patents spanning AI-driven pharmaceutical development and medical devices, that is intellectual property created on UAE soil, addressing healthcare challenges that would otherwise require imported solutions. When women scientists at Masdar City and Khalifa University advance research in solar energy systems, carbon captured materials, or sustainable desalination, they are producing foundational science that the UAE’s Net-Zero 2050 Strategy depends upon.

Masdar’s WiSER (Women in Sustainability, Environment and Renewable Energy) programme has graduated professional young women from over 30 nationalities, closing the gap in the global sustainability workforce. In healthcare, women scientists are active in the areas where AI, genomics, and precision medicine converge. The Emirati Genome Programme, M42’s Omics Center of Excellence, and the Abu Dhabi Stem Cells Center all represent domains where locally produced research can reduce the country’s reliance on imported diagnostics and therapeutics.

From these examples, it is clear that women scientists’ and researchers’ contributions are a central pillar of the national R&D ecosystem.

A Regional And Global Perspective

The UAE’s experience is instructive for the wider region. Across the Arab world, up to 57% of STEM graduates are women, yet the MENA region maintains one of the lowest female workforce participation rates globally at 19%. Saudi Arabia’s Vision 2030 has made notable progress, with women’s workforce participation reaching 36.2% and women now comprising 40.9% of the Kingdom’s researchers. The challenge across the GCC and MENA is consistent: converting educational attainment into sustained professional participation and research output. Globally, only one in three researchers is a woman, and parity in engineering, mathematics, and computer science is not projected until 2052. UNESCO’s 2026 International Day of Women and Girls in Science theme — “From Vision to Impact” — captures this urgency well.

The Way Forward: From Vision To Impact

As an academic working at the intersection of artificial intelligence and healthcare research in Dubai, I witness this potential daily — in students who arrive with rigour and ambition, in researchers producing work that stands alongside the best globally, and in a national ecosystem that increasingly treats women’s scientific participation as a strategic priority rather than a social courtesy. But policies alone do not produce innovation. What produces innovation is funding, access to facilities, clear pathways from research to commercialisation, and the recognition that a woman scientist publishing a patent in the UAE is building national capability in exactly the same way as the infrastructure projects that make headlines.

Sustained commitment is key — from governments, institutions, and the private sector — to ensure that every woman scientist in this region has the funding, the platforms, and the pathways to convert her research into national impact. When women scientists thrive, nations innovate faster. The UAE understands this. Now it must ensure the rest of the ecosystem does too.