Ana Victoria Ladeira – YGT in Knowledge Management
Tell us about your work experience in ESA so far. What does your role entail?
As a YGT in Knowledge Management, my job is very horizontal and involves contact with lots of different parts of the Agency! I get to be involved in many of our different Knowledge Management initiatives, especially regarding our projects involving knowledge from information and data. ESA produces a tremendous amount of knowledge running space missions, and no single human can keep track of it all. Maybe an engineering problem someone is facing now was solved in the context of a comet mission twenty years ago? Knowledge management tries keep track of who knows what, what knowledge is contained in which documents, what are the best practices for a problem, among others. Given my background in natural language processing and artificial intelligence, I get to help automate the extraction of relevant information from different documents and connect different repositories of knowledge within ESA. In such a big institution spanning multiple countries, it is very important to help connect dots and find synergies between projects, reports, people and research. I also help support our different knowledge dissemination tools and collaborate with different groups within ESA to help them adopt such tools and implement best practices to make sure knowledge is identified, captured, shared and exploited.
What has motived you to study these subjects?
I am passionate about solving problems, and AI has been booming as a tool to help solve problems that are traditionally very hard to solve using traditional programming and computer science methods, such as understanding natural language. I also really liked the fact that I could work with AI in so many different industries, because I like being able to move around and interface with many kinds of professionals.
What is the most exciting part of your job?
Given how broad my job is, I really get to see and meet many different people in the Agency and get some insight on the work they are doing and how it all fits together to achieve our space exploration goals. ESA also spent a lot of the last years investing in digitalization and organizing these different knowledge sources, and I get to be one of the first people to exploit this data and look for the treasures that are within it.
What advice would you give to girls interested in pursuing a career or studies in STEM?
Connect with other women following the similar paths as you! I have been so fortunate to have multiple opportunities to connect with other women in my field, and it has always been very inspiring. It’s important to support each other, amplify our voices and help each other occupy space and make way for other women in the future.
How do you imagine the future of space exploration?
I’m a bit of a sci-fi nerd, so I like dreaming about the very distant future where we can interact with other intelligent species and learn about their culture, languages and history. The universe is so big, and although we are separated by so many light years, I like thinking that there are other civilizations out there, also trying to find out if they are alone or not. I really wish I get to be alive for the first time we discover life elsewhere, even if it’s not intelligent life, and I am very excited about missions trying to find exoplanets and biomarkers, like Cheops, Gaia and the JWST. I can imagine that such discovery would really boost interest and excitement about space exploration.