Hemu Kharel Kafle, PhD is a scientist at the Kathmandu Institute of Applied Sciences (KIAS) and Head of the Center for Water and Atmospheric Research within it. She graduated as an Environmentalist from the Ben-Gurion University (Israel) and obtained her PhD in Remote Sensing from the Nagoya University (Japan). Dr Kafle’s main research interest is extreme climatic conditions like drought and desertification and their impact on agriculture and water resources. She has also worked on air and soil pollution in Kathmandu Valley. Her post-doctoral research at the Weizmann Institute of Science (Israel) focused mainly on the survival of plant species, mainly afforested forests in extreme climatic conditions. Her research career thus far has resulted in 12 peer-reviewed publications with 10 of them as a lead author in high-impact journals. She is also working on commercializing the low-cost weather station built by her research team at KIAS, Nepal. Dr. Kafle is also passionate about public engagement with science and is the founding president of the Organization of Women Scientists in Nepal (OWSN). This non-profit organization is also a national chapter of the Organization of Women in Science for a Developing World (OWSD) under UNESCO.
OWSN works mostly to encourage girls to be involved in STEAM, facilitate in improving science education in Nepali Schools/Universities, create STEAM mentorship/opportunities for females, awareness of the facilities available for scholarships/funding for higher studies, bring women and girls role models in front of the society and also provide feedbacks for improving our internal system related to scientific education and research in Nepal.
