TEHRAN Hosna Salimi, a student of the Faculty of World Studies at University of Tehran, has been named the Young Researcher of the Year in BRICS and Shanghai Cooperation Organization Young Leaders Award 2025, held on January 24-26 in Kazan, Russia.Over 400 participants from 13 countries including Iran, India, China, the UAE, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Pakistan, Uzbekistan, South Africa, Brazil, Ethiopia, Tajikistan, and Russia competed against each other, IRNA reported.The jury chose 10 winners in five nominations including Media Influencer of the Year, Social Entrepreneur of the Year, Public Diplomacy Project of the Year, Researcher of the Year, Eco-initiative of the Year.Candidates in the Young Researcher of the Year nomination are authors of scientific research in the fields of history, education, art, information technology (IT), law, philosophy, and finance.The Award aims to identify talented young people and recognize the contribution of young leaders of the BRICS and SCO countries to socially significant areas, attract young people to cooperation, and provide them with opportunities for self-realization in the BRICS and SCO countries.Iranian female scholars shine in BRICS startups contestFour Iranian women namely Azam Karami, Mahvash Abyari, Marzieh Ebrahimi, and Seyedeh Fateme Hosseini were chosen among the winners of the BRICS Womens Startups Contest 2024.The event, which aims to spotlight and support women-led startups across BRICS nations and beyond, was launched in June and extended until October 5.The contests international panel of judges considered more than 1,000 applications from 30 countries.The contest winners included 26 projects in such areas as innovation in energy and infrastructure facilities; artificial intelligence technologies in medicine, education, agriculture, and the aviation industry; the fight against cancer and infertility; and robotics.Iranian women rank second in terms of the number of winners in startups contest following Russia.Karami received the award in the nomination Artificial Intelligence for her project titled Automatic Fault Detection in Power Transmission Lines.The award in the nomination Health and Medicine went to Abyari, and Ebrahimi for their projects named Insightfully scanned glucose monitoring and Immune cell bank for the treatment of cancer and autoimmune diseases, respectively.Hosseini received the award in the nomination Innovation and Infrastructure with her project called Intelligent spoon for tremor alleviation.Promoting womens entrepreneurship and unleashing leadership, ensuring the expansion of womens business networks in the BRICS countries are among the main goals of the contest.It also aims to deepen B2B cooperation among women entrepreneurs, increase the participation of women in the BRICS countries economies, and create multilateral projects.The inclusion of womens businesses in global value chains is another goal of the contest.The general partner of the BRICS Womens Business Alliance series of events is Sberbank PJSC, Russias largest bank, and a leading global financial institution.The strategic partner of the Contest is another leader of Russias banking industry Gazprombank (Joint Stock Company).Startups from 14 countries will receive communication support from the BRICS Womens Business Alliance.MT/MG