Ruth Satter was born in New York City in 1923 and graduated from Barnard College with a B.A., in mathematics and physics. After a few years of employment, she remained home for 17 years, raising four children. In 1964, she began graduate studies in plant physiology at the University of Connecticut. After completing her Ph.D. at age 45, she was a postdoctoral fellow, then research associate at Yale University. In 1980 she returned to the University of Connecticut as a Professor in Residence. Dr. Satter is best known for her work on circadian leaf movement. While busy as a researcher, teacher, mother, and wife, she also was active in the American Institute of Biological Sciences, the American Society of Plant Physiology, and AWIS. She was very much concerned that women have equal opportunities in science and, through her will, established an award for women re-entering the sciences after a break in their education to raise a family.
Luise Meyer-Schutzmeister was a Senior Physicist in the Physics Division at Argonne National Laboratory, a Fellow of the American Physical Society, and a world-renowned nuclear spectroscopist. Born in Germany in 1915, she pursued her Ph.D. research at the Technical University in Berlin through the difficulties of the war years. In the early 1950s, she and her physicist husband emigrated to the United States.
