Dr. Luis von Ahn
Dr. Luis von Ahn is a Guatemalan entrepreneur and software developer and is currently serving as the CEO of the language learning company, Duolingo.
Luis Federico Leloir, MD
Dr. Luis Federico Leloir was a biochemist and he was the third Argentinian to win a Nobel Prize. He discovered sugar nucleotides and their role in metabolism and energy storage.
Helen Rodriguez-Trias, MD
Dr. Helen Rodriguez-Trias was a physician, public health expert, women’s rights activist, and the first Latina leader of the American Public Health Association. She used the experiences of bias and racism that she observed to drive her activism in women’s health and helping disadvantaged populations.
José Celso Barbosa, MD
Dr. José Barbosa was the first Afro-Puerto Rican to obtain a MD in the US and was considered the “Father of Puerto Rico Statehood Movement’. He served the poor, taught medicine, created a collective, and established a healthcare insurance program.
Alonzo Atencio, PhD
Dr. Alonzo Atencio was known as the Godfather of Minority Medical Education through his efforts to increase recruitment of diverse scholars and the founding of SACNAS.
Ellen Lauri Ochoa, PhD
Dr. Ellen Ochoa was the first Hispanic woman to go in space and first Hispanic Director at the Johson Space Center.
Ynés Mexia
Ynés Enriquetta Julietta Mexía (1870-1938) was a pioneering botanist and contributed immensely to the field. She was born May 24th, 1870, in Washington D.C., while her father worked as a representative for the Mexican consulate. She moved every few years or so from Texas to Pennsylvania, Maryland, and Mexico until the death of her first […]
Albert Vinicio Baez, PhD
Dr. Albert Vinicio Baez (1912-2007) was a pioneer in x-ray optics, a co-inventor of the x-ray reflection microscope, and advocate for science education. Baez was born in Puebla, Mexico in 1912. His family moved to the United States when he was two. His father worked as a minister at the First Spanish Methodist Church in […]
Major Fernando Emilio Rodríguez Vargas, DDS
Fernando Emilio Rodríguez Vargas was born on February 24th, 1888, in Adjuntas, Puerto Rico and traveled daily to Ponce for his early education. He received his Teaching Certificate at the University of Puerto Rico, before working at the IRS an inspector, and then the US War Department as a translator. He obtained his DDS (1913) […]
Lydia Villa-Komaroff, PhD
Dr. Lydia Villa-Komaroff was born on August 7, 1947, in Las Vegas but grew up Santa Fe, New Mexico after her parents immigrated to the United States to escape the Mexican Revolution. At a young age, she knew she wanted to be a scientist. Initially she enrolled at University of Washington to study Chemisty, but […]