On the 14th, UNESCO announced the list of winners of the 2024 L'Oreal UNESCO World Outstanding Female Scientist Award (WEAS), recognizing their pioneering research in the fields of life and environmental sciences. Chinese scientist Yan Ning is one of the five winners. The United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO) has released a statement stating that the winners of this year will be selected by an independent international jury from 350 candidates worldwide. The outstanding achievements of the winners prove that the scientific community needs women's participation more than ever before to deal with major public health problems and other challenges, including cancer, malaria, polio, obesity, diabetes, epilepsy and other diseases. The communique stated that Yan Ning, a professor at the School of Life Sciences at Tsinghua University, founding dean of the Shenzhen Academy of Medical Sciences, and director of the Shenzhen Bay Laboratory, discovered various membrane protein atomic structures that mediate ion and sugar transmembrane transport, revealing the principle of transmembrane transport. Her outstanding research has advanced research on various diseases such as epilepsy and arrhythmia, and guided the treatment of pain syndrome. Professor Yan Ning inspires female scientists around the world and strongly advocates gender equality in scientific research and education. The World Outstanding Female Scientist Award was jointly established by UNESCO and the L'Oreal Group of France in 1998, and is awarded annually to five female scientists selected from five major regions: Africa and Arab countries, Asia Pacific region, Europe, Latin America and the Caribbean region, and North America. This year's award ceremony will be held on May 28th at the headquarters of UNESCO in Paris. The other four winners of this year are Rose Lake, former director of the Department of Infectious Diseases and Immunology at the School of Medicine and Biomedical Sciences at the First University of Yaound é in Cameroon, Alicia Kovartao, professor of biochemistry at the University of S ã o Paulo in Brazil, Nada Jabado, professor of pediatrics and human genetics at McGill University in Canada, and Genevieve Alemuz, research director at the French National Center for Scientific Research. (Lai Xin She)