This year UN Women puts innovation by women and girls – for women and girls – at the heart of its efforts to achieve gender equality. It is all about looking at innovative ways in which gender equality can be advanced and empower women: creating opportunities is key.

STYLE wants to pay tribute to a few courageous women who are pushing back gender stereotypes to show that, in professions usually considered suitable only for men to do, women can do them, too – and sometimes even better.

Check out five women showing us there are no gender barriers when it comes to the “hard” jobs.

Roberta Bondar

As a neurologist, astronaut, landscape and avian photographer, non-profit founder, author and public speaker, it would seem Dr Roberta Bondar has been given more hours in the day than the average human being.

Bondar, 73, received her bachelor of science degree in zoology and agriculture in 1968 – then passed a master of science degree in experimental pathology in 1971, a doctorate in neurobiology in 1974, and her doctor of medicine degree in 1977. She was then admitted as a fellow of the Royal College of Physicians and Surgeons of Canada in neurology in 1981.

Yet one of her most impressive feats is becoming the first Canadian woman and first neurologist in space, where she circled the Earth 129 times for a total flight distance of 5,407 million km (3,360 miles).

Being privy to one of the rarest views of Earth, Bondar was inspired to become a nature photographer and national parks seem to be her favourite subject.

Katie Taylor

Katie Taylor, the unified WBA and IBF World Lightweight boxing champion and Olympic gold medallist in the women’s lightweight division at the 2012 London Games, is Ireland’s pride and joy.

Boxing is in her blood: her father was a 1986 Irish senior light heavyweight champion boxer, while her mother is a former boxing referee.

Taylor, 32, who turned professional in 2016, won her first boxing bout at the age of age 17 in 2005 and made Irish boxing history by becoming the first Irish woman in the lightweight division to win a gold medal at the Senior European Boxing Championships.

Although rules dictate she fights other women boxers, when she first took up the sport she had to pretend to be a boy to enter boxing clubs.

This was revealed in Katie, an award-winning, highly acclaimed feature-length film documentary looking at her career, released last October.

Away from the ring Katie remains shy and reserved, but also has a steely willpower and focus – qualities that have helped to make her a champion.

Leona Chin 

You may have already heard of Leona Chin, but if you haven’t, shame on you.

Don’t let her sweet and girlie demeanour fool you. Chin, 32, has been breaking stereotypical barriers and has also taken the world of circuit racing, rallying and drifting (where drivers intentionally oversteer and skid, while maintaining control)– which are regarded as predominantly male activities – by storm.

The Malaysian driver has won both the Caterham Motorsports Championship and the Saturday Night Fever National Series Championship. She also received an award as one of the top 10 “Iconic Malaysians” at the ICON Magazine 10th Anniversary Ball in 2017.

Although this year has barely begun, the Asia Automotive Awards 2019 named her as the most promising female motorsport athlete, which followed her 2018 Petronas Sepang Circuit MAM Award as most inspiring female motorsport athlete.

In addition to her grit and beauty, Chin also has a great sense of humour, too. In several popular YouTube videos, Chin has posed as a seemingly harmless girl driver in a bid to trick unsuspecting passengers by subjecting them to her passion for drifting mid-ride.

Avani Chaturvedi

Flight Lieutenant Avani Chaturvedi, 25, is one of the first fighter pilots in the Indian Air Force.

In 2016 she was selected as one of three female fighter pilots to be commissioned into the nation’s fighter squadron by India’s defence minister.

Last year she became the first female pilot in the Indian Air Force to complete a solo flight in a MiG-21 Bison – a supersonic jet fighter and interceptor.

She studied aviation as a side subject at an aviation school while she was studying for her bachelor’s degree in technology.

After discovering she had a knack for flying aircraft she was encouraged to become a pilot and carried out her training at Hyderabad Air Force Academy.

Last year the young pilot received an honorary doctoral degree at Banasthali Vidyapeeth, a women’s university in Newai, India.

She is currently based with the Indian Air Force’s No 23 Squadron (Panthers), at Suratgarh Air Force Station, in Rajasthan, in northern India.

Lynsey Addario

The image of a war photographer is often suffused with machismo. Women war photographers are seen as enigmatic creatures.

Yet while they may be in the minority, some have made history.

American Lynsey Addario, 45, is regarded as a top war photographer.

The Pulitzer-prize-winning photojournalist and The New York Times bestselling author of, the memoir, It's What I Do: A Photographer's Life of Love and War, doesn’t actually consider herself as a war photographer, but concedes that some people regard her as one.

She started out as a photographer wanting to document conflict and human struggles.

Addario was in Afghanistan just before – and after – the September 11 terrorist attacks in the United States. It meant she was no longer there in Afghanistan simply to witness women’s issues in the region: she was also able to document what was happening in areas of Afghanistan as they fell under the Taliban’s control.

Her 2018 book, Of Love & War, is a collection of more than 200 photographs taken in across the Middle East, South Asia and Africa – chosen from her huge portfolio of images from her two-decade career – showing the devastating consequences of human conflict, plus personal journal entries and letters.