THE MATILDA PROJECT

The Matilda Project is an educational resource to raise awareness of the gender bias towards woman in science and illuminate (just some of!) the incredible contributions women have made to science, especially “those who have been overlooked, denied credit, or otherwise marginalized.” The project features several illustrated biographies of women in science.

I created these illustrations for the entry on Dr. Mary Maynard Daly (1921 – 2003), the first African-American woman in the United States to earn a doctorate in chemistry. As a postdoctoral researcher at the Rockefeller Institute with molecular biologist Alfred Mirsky, she made crucial contributions to the understanding of basic proteins: the structure and function of histones, protein synthesis, and the structure of pyrimidines and purines. In his Nobel Prize lecture, James Watson (who had co-received the Nobel Prize for work on the double helix structure on DNA) cited the work that Daly had done with Mirsky and Vincent Allfrey on the role of RNA in protein synthesis. Daly continued to do early foundational work on the link between cholesterol and atherosclerosis, other aspects of cardiovascular health, and how muscle cells uptake creatine. She was also a teacher, mentor, and advocate for women and minority students.

You can check the full entry (and all the other beautiful and informative entries) here: The Matilda Project

So grateful to have had this opportunity to explore so freely, to learn about these incredible women in science, and to work with such an amazing group of writers and illustrators.
Thank you so much to Shehryar & Shehroze!

CREDITS:

Directed by: Shehryar (Shay) Saharan and Shehroze Saharan