​Mary Olson
GRIP Founder, Executive Director
Ionized Radiation Exposed Civilian, Activist

Olson spoke at the EU Gender Summit in London, 2018, as well as the Low-Dose Radiation Conference in Stirling, Scotland, events which led to her peer reviewed paper in 2019 in the special Gender edition of Interdisciplinary Science Reviews. In 2020 Olson served at an expert consultation on an update on the humanitarian consequences of the use of nuclear weapons for the International Committee of the Red Cross / Red Crescent in Geneva, Switzerland. ​

Mary served from 1991 to 2019 as Staff Biologist and Senior Radioactive Waste Policy Analyst at US-based Nuclear Information and Resource Service, a non-government organization. Olson’s work on radiation education lead her to the queson of whether biological sex is a factor in radiation harm. Her paper, ‘Atomic Radiaon is More Harmful to Women’ (2011) was featured at the Vienna Conference on the Humanitarian Impacts of Nuclear Weapons (2014); at the UN Nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty Review of 2015; the International Committee of the Red Cross Asia regional meeting in St Petersburg, Russia and the EU Gender Summit, in Brussels, both in 2016.

Through her work as a staff biologist and policy analyst at Nuclear Information and Resource Service, Mary has spent decades working for greater health and greater protection for people in communities impacted by nuclear activities. She has studied radiation health consequences with some of the leading radiation researchers of the 20th Century.

• In 2014, she presented at the Vienna Conference on Humanitarian Consequences of Nuclear Weapons and in 2015, she spoke during the United Nations review of the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty.
• In 2016, she was a featured speaker on the medical consequences of nuclear weapons at an event sponsored by the International Committee of the Red Cross in Russia and presented as a featured panelist at the Gender Summit 9 in Brussels.
• In 2017, Mary returned to the U..N. where her presentation on gender issues impacted the preamble to the treaty being written to include the findings.
• In 2018 she spoke at the Gender Summit 15 in London and participated in two events in Scotland - the first with the Union of Radio Ecologists and the second at the Low-Dose Radiation

Mary’s background in biology, biochemistry, her work as a staff biologist and policy analyst at Nuclear Information and Resource Service, and her own experience with radioactive contamination as a young woman have put her in a unique position to speak publicly on radiation policy from a health, safety, and humanitarian perspective. 

PROJECT Progress Status

Updates of 2/2025 > 
2025 TPNW in NYC, March 3rd    Mary Olson will be joining as a guest speakerthe breakout session StillGlowing.org is co-hosting with Yeal Danielli.

We continue to support a 2025 Project address female-inclusive basis for radiaon protecon standards to help prevent unnecessary radiaon exposure and reduce radiaon harm.