Malgorzata Celuch
Two years ago I had the pleasure of reporting to the IEEE Microwave Magazine readership [1] on the MIKON Polish traditional microwave conference, part of the 2020 Microwave and Radar Week (MRW) [2] and held under the auspices of the Polish Academy of Sciences and IEEE. MRW2020 was special as one of the very first conferences taking place physically after the pandemic break, with live sessions, industrial exhibits, and networking opportunities. And for the first time in MIKON’s several decades’ history, it included a dedicated Women in Microwaves (WIM) session. As I summarized in my article, there were always women present at MIKON, but never before had there been a dedicated WIM event.
Enjoying our first WIM session at MIKON2020, we were full of hope that the pandemic hardships were coming to an end and every next edition of the conference would be providing to us a forum for more relaxed discussions with a broader international audience. No one preached doom and gloom, and no one thought that MIKON2022 would be taking place so close to a war. Fundraising activities (Figure 1) for victims of the war were undertaken during MRW2022 in Gdansk last September [3].
Figure 1. Gdansk University of Technology social events venue. (Source: Photo courtesy of Rafal Lech.)
MIKON was first organized in Poland in 1969 and became an international event in 1994, thanks to support by the IEEE Microwave Theory and Technology Society (MTT-S). Since 2004, MIKON has been the central event of the MRW, which is organized bi-annually in different cities in Poland, an exception being the 2010 event in Vilnius, Lithuania. Several other attempts to move the conference to the neighboring countries of Lithuania or Ukraine were compromised by either a war, threat of war, or COVID complications.
The traditional timing of the MIKON conference is in the spring; however, the 2020 edition was shifted to October in the anticipation that pandemic restrictions would be relaxed. The 2022 edition had to be shifted as well because of COVID picking up again and due to the fear that the war just across the border of Poland would discourage foreign participants from attending. Hence, the technical program committee was nicely surprised with the nearly 400 paper submissions it received. The final MRW program featured 255 papers—149 at MIKON and 106 at the sister conference, the International Radar Symposium (IRS). Authors came from 35 countries, the biggest contributors being Poland (30%), Germany (17%), Italy (8%), and China (6.5%).
MRW2022 was hosted by the Gdansk University of Technology, with most sessions taking place in the historical main building. MIKON and IRS were run in parallel and shared one plenary session. There was a common registration, and the participants could freely move between the two conferences, additionally interacting during lunches (Figure 1) and social events. There were 413 registrants and a hybrid online option was set up for those who could not come in person; all sessions and events, both live and virtual, were busy and productive. Through the opening roof of the Shakespeare Theatre during the MRW banquet, all could see that the sky was the limit (Figure 2)! The MRW spirit further permeated its satellite events, which included five workshops and tutorials, and, last but not least, an industrial exhibition.
Figure 2. The Shakespeare Theatre in Gdansk opening its roof during deserts to show the sky. (Source: Photo courtesy of Karol Makurat @tarakum_photography.)
As in previous years, the leadership of MRW2022 was safely in the hands of Prof. Jozef Modelski of the Warsaw University of Technology, Poland (IEEE Fellow, former MTT-S president, and Region 8 director). The chairs of MIKON2022 were Prof. Michal Mrozowski and Prof. Krzysztof Nyka, both of Gdansk University of Technology. The chairs of IRS 2022 were Prof. Peter Knott, Fraunhofer Institute FHR, Germany, and Prof. Krzysztof Kulpa, Warsaw University of Technology. The MIKON technical program committee (TPC) was chaired by Prof. Adam Lamecki, Gdansk University of Technology and Prof. Roberto Gomez-Garcia, University of Alcala, Spain, and the IRS TPC was chaired by Prof. Jacek Misiurewicz, Warsaw University of Technology. The organizing committee was chaired by Prof. Rafal Lech, Gdansk University of Technology. Prof. Maurizio Bozzi, University of Pavia, Italy, served as IEEE/MTT liaison.
Among the abovementioned key names, no female names appear, apparently undermining the place of this article in the WIM column. The truth is, women were active behind the scenes during all MRW preparations. And we made ourselves visible and heard during the conference, which was specifically true for the “three ladies in red†(Trio Siesta) playing wonderful music during the banquet (Figure 2).
On the technical side, two female IEEE MTT-S Distinguished Microwave Lecturers (DMLs) attended the conference and gave their DML talks: Prof. Dimitra Psychogiou in a plenary session (Figure 3) and Prof. Jasmin Grosinger in a WIM session (Figure 4).
Figure 3. Prof. Dimitra Psychogiou in a plenary session. (Source: Photo courtesy of Karol Makurat @tarakum_photography.)
Figure 4. Jasmin Grosinger giving a DML talk at the WISE session. WISE: Women in Science and Engineering. (Source: Photo courtesy of Karol Makurat @tarakum_photography.)
In addition, a younger WIM generation was successfully represented: Weronika Kalista won first prize in the IEEE contest for best master thesis and, awarded for the first time at MIKON, a special prize under the auspices of the Polish Section of IEEE Women in Engineering (WIE) (Figure 5).
Figure 5. Weronika Kalista receiving first prize, as well as a special prize under the auspices of the Polish Section of IEEE WIE. (Source: Photo courtesy of Karol Makurat @tarakum_photography.)
Yet another indisputable sign of the role of women at MRW was the arrival of Prof. Rashaunda Henderson, IEEE MTT-S president—the second female president in MTT-S history. In the December 2022 issue of the Microwave Magazine [4], Rashaunda shared some of her impressions from MRW2022, including our WIM actions, which I further describe below.
Are there fewer women than men in microwaves? Yes, would be a spontaneous answer, but answers often depend on how one poses a question, and in this case, on how one defines microwaves. At a typical microwave conference focusing on the engineering aspects, more men than women are seen. But “microwaves†also involves the scientific aspects, such as the mathematics of solving the relevant equations of physics and the physical chemistry of materials. In my activities within the European Horizon Framework projects and initiatives, such as the European Materials Modeling Council, I meet more women than men, and the concerns and dilemmas of those women professionals do not differ from mine. Defining microwaves as the sum of science and engineering gives rise to the broader scope of the WIM session, called the Women in Science and Engineering (WISE) Matinee (Figure 6). And although not explicitly included in the WISE acronym, the program of the session further included project management aspects, procurement chains, and public communication. The speakers came from big industry, research institutes, academia, and small and midsize enterprises. Some aspects were being fine-tuned until the day before the session, during beach walks, and during the preconference WISE dinner.
Figure 6. Participants of the WIM–WISE session at MIKON-MRW2022.
The first part of the WISE afternoon was dedicated to technical talks. After a welcome by J. Modelski, Jasmin Grosinger gave an abbreviated version of her DML talk on “RF Design for Ultra Low-Power Wireless Communication Systems†(thank you, Jasmin, for coming and for adjusting the talk to the session format!). Jasmin stressed how much she valued the world of academia and research, and that while scientific projects are not typically profit oriented, her research always aims at the satisfaction of project and technology partners (Figure 4).
The second talk was given by Rashaunda Henderson, who described her career path, how her passion for teaching made her return from industry to academia, and how IEEE helped her do so. And she passed on a “big phonon†of positive energy to the audience.
Then Agnieszka Konczykowska (IEEE Fellow, member of the Editorial Board of Proceedings of the IEEE) described her path, which was the opposite: having moved from Poland to France, she faced fewer bureaucratic obstacles in establishing herself in industry than in academia, and that is what she did, remaining at the forefront of research in her field.
The final technical talk, given online by Alessandra Costanzo, was a perspective of a newly elected IEEE Fellow. Alessandra said that as a woman, she never felt discriminated against by others, but she had to solve her own challenges of being a scientist and a mother to three children.
The second part of the afternoon illustrated different perspectives. Janine Jost, Eurice and H2020 NanoBat project, discussed challenges and opportunities for women in European Commission–funded projects. She made the point that if you do not quite (or no longer!) feel like being a scientist, but you want to stay close to science, research project management may be what you would appreciate and enjoy doing.
Paulina Epler, Raytheon Technologies Corporation, Poland, shared her perspective of a woman in the defense sector. She has had to fight many prejudices, but as she admitted, that satisfied her ego and was worth the effort.
Final thoughts came from Cerine Mokhtari, a Ph.D. student at the University of Lille. She was concerned with the precariat and lack of stability, amplified by not being a native of the country where she would be trying to settle.
With so many perspectives, the main conclusions of the discussion that followed were common and… WISE: Believe in yourself, work hard toward your goals, fight for your truth, but take kindly the counsel of the years.
While different sectors were represented at the WISE session, the participants regretted that many regular contributors to MIKON, coming from Eastern European countries, were unable to attend and participate this year. An idea came up to repeat the WISE session in an online format during the IEEE Ukrainian Microwave Week [5] in November 2022. It did materialize, but that is a separate story.
The 2022 MRW was a milestone—the 10th edition. And that milestone was well marked by high attendance, excellent technical quality, and wonderful organization of the event. The IEEE MTT-S AdCom support (Figure 7) was especially appreciated.
Figure 7. Three MTT-S presidents and the AdCom secretary attending and showing support for MRW: Rashaunda Henderson (president 2022), Jasmin Grosinger, Nuno Borges Carvalho (president 2023), and Maurizio Bozzi (president 2024). (Source: Photo courtesy of Rafal Lech.)
What about the next MRW edition, planned to be held in Wroclaw, Poland, 3–6 July 2024? Even if the MRW’s anniversary will not be a “round†one, the core conference, MIKON, will be organized for the 25th time. One more milestone to be marked and a challenge for the organizing team to meet the 2022 standards! Please pencil the date into your calendar, collect your research results to be reported, submit a paper or… just come to celebrate MIKON’s silver edition held 55 years after its first edition as a local national conference, which has matured and greatly flourished. WIM will certainly meet in Wroclaw at (what we plan to keep as a traditional) WIE matinee.
[1] M. Celuch, “Women in microwaves at MIKON: (Not) for the first time,†IEEE Microw. Mag., vol. 22, no. 7, pp. 78–82, Jul. 2021, doi: 10.1109/MMM.2021.3070815.
[2] “Microwave and radar week 2020,†Warsaw Univ. Technol., Warsaw, Poland, Oct. 2020. [Online] . Available: mrw2020.org/mikon/
[3] “Microwave and radar week 2022,†in Proc. 24th Int. Microw. Radar Conf., Gdansk, Poland, Sep. 2022. [Online] . Available: https://mrw2022.org/mikon/
[4] R. Henderson, “Let them eat cake!†IEEE Microw. Mag., vol. 23, no. 12, pp. 10–14, Dec. 2022.
[5] “IEEE Ukrainian microwave week,†Nov. 2022. [Online] . Available: http://uamweek.ieee.org.ua/
Digital Object Identifier 10.1109/MMM.2023.3265521
