[1] She studied mathematics and astronomy at the University of Turku, and soon became Yrjö Väisälä's assistant and worked on the search for minor planets.

[1] Oterma was interested in languages and spoke German, French, Italian, Spanish, Esperanto, Hungarian, English and also Arabic, for example.

Oterma's original plans were to study Sanskrit, but it was not offered at the University of Turku, and the choice was ultimately focused on astronomy.

Anders Reiz, a professor at the Copenhagen Observatory, among others, said Oterma was “silent in eleven languages”.

[2] The Hildian asteroid 1529 Oterma, discovered by Finnish astronomer Yrjö Väisälä in 1938, was named in her honour.