The Conversation

Spectacular volcanic eruptions on earth and in space - Kim Chakanetsa unites two women who share a deep love of volcanoes. Janine Krippner is from New Zealand, and as a child visited Ngauruhoe - the volcano made famous as Mount Doom in the Lord of the Rings films - and had an intense feeling that this is where she belonged. Years later she found herself inside the crater collecting research data. Janine is now based at the University of Pittsburgh and studies remote volcanoes in Russia and the US and looks for clues as to how super-fast flows of hot gas and rocks called pyroclastic flows travel after eruptions. Rosaly Lopes is a Senior Research Scientist at NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory, and she is also Manager of the Planetary Science Section. Born and raised in Brazil, Rosaly has visited over 60 active volcanoes on every continent, but as exciting as she finds these trips, volcanoes on other planets are her real focus. She has personally discovered 71 active volcanoes on Jupiter's moon Io, which has earned her a place in the record books.Image and credit (L): Janine Krippner in front of Osorno volcano, Los Lagos Region, southern Chile Image and credit (R): Rosaly Lopes on Mount Yasur volcano, Tanna Island, Vanuatu

Two doctors at the epicentre of the AIDS crisis - Glenda Gray and Wafaa El-Sadr - have worked tirelessly to care for those affected by the virus, to combat its spread, and to get the drugs to those who need it.Glenda Gray is a South African paediatrician and world-renowned scientist who currently directs the HIV Vaccine Trials study, which is the largest of its kind ever conducted in South Africa. Thanks in part to her work on mother-to-child transmission, the number of babies born with HIV has dropped dramatically from 600,000 a year to 150,000. Glenda herself grew up under Apartheid in a family of activists, and carried on her fight for social justice into medical school and beyond. Wafaa El-Sadr is director of ICAP based at Columbia University in New York. Born in Egypt to a family of physicians, Wafaa was working as a young doctor in Harlem, when the first AIDS cases began to appear in the 1980s. She didn't know she was witnessing the start of an epidemic that was to sweep across the globe. Wafaa helped develop a treatment programme that is now used as a model around the world.Image: (L) Glenda Gray (credit: JP Crouch Photography) and (R) Wafaa El-Sadr (credit: Michael Dames)

Cities that come alive at night, with two women who know where to go and what to do. Kim Chakanetsa speaks to a DJ from Lebanon and a singer-songwriter from China who take her on a virtual tour of their favourite nightlife scenes.Nicole Moudaber is a Nigerian-born Lebanese DJ and music producer. Nicole began exploring Beirut's nightlife as a promoter, hosting successful club nights for years before turning her hands to the decks. She has since been described as one of the best techno DJs on the scene, sharing her distinct beats with the nightlife scenes in New York, Ibiza and beyond.ChaCha Yehaiyahan is regarded as the queen of the underground music scene in Shanghai, a city that is a far cry from the rural mountainous village she grew up in in southwest China. She left home at 16 with her sights firmly set on the bright lights of Beijing, and wound up in Shanghai, which she says has a nightlife scene unparalleled in China.Image: (L) ChaCha Yehaiyahan. Credit: AJ Schokora Image: (R) Nicole Moudaber. Credit: Woolhouse Studios

Two archaeologists take us on an underwater adventure to uncover secrets about our past. Between them they've explored wooden vessels dating back hundreds of years, discovered Roman statues in the Mediterranean and Chinese ceramics in the Gulf of Thailand, and even stumbled upon what may be an Aboriginal rubbish dump.Pornnatcha 'Jo' Sankhaprasit is Thailand's first ever female underwater archaeologist. She grew up in the Thai mountains and didn't even see the sea until she was nine years old. She's always had a passion for history and adventure, and she was drawn to marine archaeology because sites are often far better preserved underwater than on land. However the water, and deep dives in particular, still scare her - and the breathing apparatus weighs more than she does! But it's all worth it when she gets to work on ancient wrecks like the well-preserved Chinese ship that sank in the Gulf of Thailand more than 500 years ago.Sarah Ward is a renowned maritime archaeologist from Australia, who has a vast and varied experience in her field. She has worked on underwater archaeological sites from a Roman wreck off the coast of Turkey, to the Tudor flagship, the Mary Rose, and a warship that sank off the coast of Argentina in 1790. These days she works mainly on commercial maritime projects, carrying out detailed surveys and excavations of harbours, ports and other coastal sites.(L) Image: Sarah Ward. Credit:Surface Supplied Diver Training (R) Image: Pornnatcha Sankhaprasit. Credit: Ian McCann

Anoushka Shankar on sitar and Kasiva Mutua on drums...two celebrated female musicians talk to Kim Chakanetsa about their paths to mastering instruments more traditionally played by men.Anoushka Shankar's father, the legendary Indian sitar player Ravi Shankar taught her to play the instrument from the age of 9. She first performed in public with her father at 13 and got a recording contract as soon as she finished school. She says growing up surrounded by music actually meant she had a complicated relationship with it, involving both love and fear. Despite that she decided to embrace the sitar on her own terms and is now heralded as probably the best female player in the world, making nine solo albums and receiving six Grammy nominations for her work. Anoushka says she's now experimenting with her music in ways she wished she had done 20 years ago.Kasiva Mutua is a Kenyan percussionist who discovered her love for drums at a young age, finding rhythms in her grandmother's stories and in the everyday sounds around her. She pursued drumming in secret throughout her teenage years before deciding to make a career of it - much to the dismay of her family and the wider community; female drumming in Kenya is considered taboo. Determined to follow her passion Kasiva is now an internationally touring drummer and part of the African music initiative The Nile Project. She says she had to fight to play - but it's all been worth it.(L) Image: Kasiva Mutua on drums at the Miami Dade NP Concert in 2015 US Tour. Credit: Jim Virga (R) Image: Anoushka Shankar with sitar. Credit: Jamie-James Medina / Deutsche Grammophon

Forget the wicked witch or the pretty princess - a new generation of women in animation are doing away with cartoon cliches. Kim Chakanetsa talks to two women doing their bit to ensure that female characters are accurately drawn from life, rather than stereotypes.Niki Yang grew up in South Korea visiting comic book rooms and watching Japanese anime on TV - which helped her realise her passion for drawing and storytelling. Niki established her own career in animation when she moved to Los Angeles more than a decade ago. She's since worked on a number of well-known cartoons including Family Guy and Adventure Time. She says the birth of her son has introduced a new humour to her life and work.Aliki Theofilopoulos is a Greek-American television writer and animator, who's currently working at DreamWorks. As a child she loved watching slapstick cartoons like Bugs Bunny and Looney Tunes, but it was Disney's Dumbo that truly inspired her to work in animation. In a career spanning more than 20 years, Aliki has worked on household hits like Mulan and Hercules. She's also worked on popular TV series Phineas and Ferb which sees two step-brothers invent wonderful and wacky machines. Image: Niki Yang (l) and Aliki Theofilopoulos (r) Credit: Niki Yang (l) & Epic Imagery (r)

Calculator tricks and baking cakes - how two female mathematicians help people have fun with maths. Eugenia Cheng's aim is to rid the world of 'math phobia' and she uses baking to explain complex mathematical ideas to the general public, via her books and YouTube channel. For instance, she makes puff pastry to reveal how exponential growth works. Eugenia has taught Pure Mathematics at universities in the UK, France and US and is currently Scientist in Residence at the School of the Art Institute of Chicago. Her most recent book is called Beyond Infinity: An Expedition to the Outer Limits of the Mathematical Universe. Sara Santos engages the unsuspecting public in maths through a kind of street performance. Originally from Portugal, Sara now runs a company called Maths Busking in the UK, and tours festivals, schools and corporate events wearing a yellow top hat and doing maths for people's amusement. Her 'tricks' include tying people up with ropes and guessing their birthdays. Sara says the idea that only very clever people are good at maths is rubbish; anyone can do it. (L) Image and credit: Eugenia Cheng (R) Image: Sara Santos. Credit: Paul Clarke

Growing up with a name that has resonance around the world - and a father with a towering reputation. That's been the experience of Samia Nkrumah and Noo Saro-Wiwa. We'll hear about the pride and burdens they carry with them, and how their fathers' untimely deaths have shaped their lives.Samia Nkrumah is the daughter of Ghana's first president, Kwame Nkrumah - the man who led his country to independence in 1957, and became an international symbol of freedom as the leader of the first African country to shake off the chains of colonial rule. Samia was just 11 at the time of her father's death, and hadn't seen him for six years, after the family were separated following his overthrow. Still, Samia decided to follow her father into politics and currently chairs the Convention People's Party, a political party in Ghana founded by her father.Noo Saro-Wiwa is the daughter of Ken Saro-Wiwa, the Nigerian writer and environmental activist who was killed in 1995 after leading peaceful protests against the oil industry in his home region of Ogoniland. Noo was a 19-year-old student at the time of his death. She went on to become a journalist and author based in the UK - she has written an account of her own journey around Nigeria called 'Looking for Transwonderland'.Image: Samia Nkrumah (credit: Samia Nkrumah) (l) and NooSaro-Wiwa (credit: Michael Wharley) (r)

What draws women to motorbikes, whether it's weaving them through traffic or seeing the world from one? Kim Chakanetsa asks two women from Poland and Kenya who spend their lives in the saddle. Aleksandra 'Ola' Trzaskowska's love of motorbikes is not about the machine itself - it's about the thrill of seeing new places from the best vantage point. She used to be a lawyer in Warsaw but gave it up to do what she loves. Ola now runs tours on two wheels to Asia, North Africa and both American continents. On her own trips she always aims to steer off the beaten track - preferring to explore countries like Afghanistan alone. Even breaking her leg in a road accident in Cuba hasn't put her off - as soon as it's mended she'll be straight back on her bike. Naomi Irungu took up bikes two years ago when she met her motorcycle-mad husband. She had always wanted to try but was warned off by her family after her uncle died in a motorbike accident. Naomi says it can be exhilarating and scary riding through rush-hour traffic in Nairobi, dodging the matatus and the taxi-bikes that jostle for road space. She loves to get out of the city on longer rides and for her recent wedding she was picked up by a 15 strong motorcade of biker friends.L-Image and credit: Ola Trzaskowska R-Image and credit: Naomi Irungu

The power of art to change lives. Two women talk to Kim Chakanetsa about how they use art to enable refugees, asylum seekers and young women to find their creative voice.Isha Fofana is a Gambian artist who set up an art centre in her country to encourage young women to pursue their artistic talents. Although she showed an interest in art at a young age, she was not fully able to explore it until she was much older. Her canvasses are often large and extremely colourful, capturing the joy and power she sees in the women around her. Zeina Iaali is a Lebanese-Australian artist who volunteers at the Refugee Art Project in Sydney, which supports refugees and asylum seekers to tell their stories through art. Her own artwork revolves around her experiences as a Muslim woman in Australia. She says art has the power to bring people together, and that's where magic happens.Photo: (L) Zeina Iaali. Credit: Refugee Art Project. (R) Isha Fofana. Credit: Mama Africa)