Margarita Salas

Margarita Salas grew up during the Spanish Civil War and matured during the era where women were not allowed equal responsibilities and treatment within the workplace (1). Despite this, she studied chemistry at Madrid University and then achieved a PhD in yeast metabolism. During her Postdoc, she identified that the RNA code UAA was a stop codon during translation. Later, she studied a bacteriophage ϕ29 and isolated it’s DNA polymerase. This was foundational for improving PCR mechanisms as this polymerase was superior in speed and accuracy. Margarita was one of the first to win a L’Oréal–UNESCO award for women for her lifetime accomplishments.

1) Avila, J., Mayor, F., & Ruiz-Desviat, L. (2019). Margarita Salas (1938–2019). Nature, 576(7786), 208. https://doi.org/10.1038/d41586-019-03758-z