Rita Levi-Montalcini - A Woman Scientist Who Inspired Me

In memory of Rita Levi-Montalcini, who died on 30 December 2012, todays post features an article that orginially appeared March 2013 in Volume 06, Issue 1 "Gender Differences".

Rita Levi-Montalcini at the international NGF meeting 2008 at Kfar Blum, Israel.

Wikimedia Commons

As part of an application for a travel fellowship, I was once asked to write an assay on a woman scientist who inspired me. It was fairly easy to pick one, as I immediately knew I had to write about neurobiologist and Nobel Prize winner Rita Levi-Montalcini. Her recent passing reminded me of those few words, which I would like to share here to commemorate her and her great achievements.

Rita’s story is an Italian one, and as usual, it begins with a family. She was born in Turin at the beginning of the last century to wealthy Jewish parents, and she had been blessed with a “wonderful family atmosphere, filled with love and reciprocal devotion” (Nobelprize.org).

The highly cultured atmosphere was challenging and stimulating, however, as a woman she suffered the sexist social environment of her time. In fact, she felt strong resentment when her father decided that all his daughters were not to attend university, as he “had a great respect for women, but he believed that a professional career would interfere with the duties of a wife and mother” (Nobelprize.org). Later on, she was fortunately able to change his mind and entered medical school. From the beginning, she fought in favor of woman emancipation and her message is still loud and clear today.

SHE SET UP A MAKESHIFT

 LAB IN HER BEDROOM

 

After she graduated in 1936, she wanted to pursue a career in research, studying the nervous system. However, two years later, racial laws were put into place and banned Jews from practicing medicine and working within academic environments. She then set up a makeshift lab in her bedroom and continued working in secret, risking imprisonment or death.

In the 1940s, Rita was still working in her bedroom. Using microsurgical and tissue manipulation equipment fashioned out of sewing needles and watchmaker's tweezers, she was able to replicate the experiments performed by Viktor Hamburger, an embryologist at Washington University in St. Louis. These were the first steps that – years later – would lead to the identification of the nerve growth factor (NGF) and to her Nobel Prize for Medicine in 1986. Her research was interrupted by the Nazi occupation forcing Rita to go into hiding until 1944. After the war ended, she was invited to join Viktor Hamburger in St. Louis. She planned to stay for a few months, but she ended up working and teaching there for thirty years.

“DIFFICULTIES GIVE THE POSSIBILITY 

TO USE AT THE BEST OUR CAPACITY”.

 

In 1962, she went back to Italy to establish a research unit in Rome and a few years later, she became Director of the Institute of Cell Biology of the Italian National Council of Research. Within the last years, she fully shared the general opinion of the Italian scientists on research in our country: it has never been adequately appreciated, despite all the great human potential. Once she declared: “Difficulties give the possibility to use at the best our capacity”. That must be dramatically true in Italy where the lack of funds, structures, and organization is a silently accepted rule.
Despite all this, in 2001, Rita strongly suggested the establishment of an Italian International research institute focusing solely on brain research. As a result, the European Brain Research Institute (EBRI) was created in 2002. This structure is dedicated to promoting her vision of a research institute of scientific excellence that attracts foreign scientists to Italy, as well as to offer Italian neuroscientists working abroad an opportunity to return home.

RITA LEVI-MONTALCINI WAS 

THE LONGEST-LIVING NOBEL LAUREATE

 


 Rita has been active and involved until the end of her long and productive life. She passed away at the age of 103. Thanks to her curiosity and enthusiasm, she has been recognized as one of the greatest scientists in the world.
My grandmother used to tell everyone that I would become a great scientist one day, just like Rita Levi-Montalcini. Whilst growing up and after having acquired a better understanding of her work and story, I developed a special fascination that soon blossomed into inspiration.
Her positivity and strong humanity are the characteristics that I have always admired most. From time to time, my grandmother still calls me lovingly “my Montalcini” and although I always point out I do not deserve such an honor, it is a reminder for myself that I want to be a good scientist and – most of all – a good person.

by Lorenza Magno, Alumna PhD Medical Neurosciences