After recently getting her high school diploma, Alessandra decided to take a gap year. She is applying for internships and talking to scientists to explore various areas and decide on the path to follow. Her dream is to become a scientist and lecturer at one of the world’s top universities. For now, she is trying to fight the stereotype that science is ‘difficult and boring’. Observing the world is a passion she discovered herself.

While still in elementary school, she received a special gift – a telescope. It sparked her fascination with astronomy and then physics, which led her to the finals of the School Physics Olympiad. She was one of very few girls to reach this stage of the contest.

Alessandra is most captivated by systems that you would not ordinarily find in school curricula: anything that is either so large or so small that it eludes human perception. – In such systems, even the slightest disturbance may cause instability. They can be cold and warm, large and small, high and low at the same time. They change when we try to ‘peek’ at them – she explains. Such problems are the domain of quantum physics, a field of study that has a special appeal to Alessandra.

– Contrary to popular belief, scientists are not old men stuck in their labs. They’re a large and diverse group of extremely smart people. They move our world forward. Don’t be intimidated about the idea of going into science! – she enthuses.