National Postdoc Appreciation Week is an event sponsored by the National Postdoctoral Association to recognize the contributions of postdoctoral scholars to research and development discovery.
In 2025, National Postdoc Appreciation Week will take place from September 15–19, and the Society for the Advancement of Chicanos and Native Americans in Science (SACNAS) has announced that it will be highlighting postdocs doing incredible work in STEM.
One of the most notable SACNAS members is the third Mexican-American woman in the United States to earn a doctorate in science.
Molecular biologist Lydia Villa-Komaroff received the 2021 SACNAS Presidential Service Award for her commitment to the organization.
“It is a great honor to receive this award, which has been given to people I so greatly admire,” Villa-Komaroff told SACNAS. “Many of them were part of a band of young faculty who conceived of a society where Chicanos and Native Americans could support each other and who welcomed this cocky graduate student to that meeting in Atlantic City where SACNAS was born. At the same time, the work that this award recognizes is work that everyone in SACNAS is involved in, and that also makes the award an honor.”
Villa-Komaroff’s most significant discovery has been featured in Hispanic Engineer magazine.
During her postdoctoral research, she was part of a team that discovered how cells could be used to generate insulin. This groundbreaking work led to advances in DNA technology and the development of protein synthesis.
Lydia entered the University of Washington in Seattle as a chemistry major. After an advisor told her that “women do not belong in chemistry,” she switched her major to biology.
In 1967, she transferred to Goucher College in Maryland after her boyfriend moved to the Washington, D.C. area to work at the National Institutes of Health. It is believed she applied to Johns Hopkins University but was not accepted because the university did not admit women at that time.
In 1970, she married her boyfriend, Dr. Anthony L. Komaroff, and the couple moved to Boston.
That same year, Villa-Komaroff enrolled at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) to pursue graduate studies in molecular biology. Her PhD dissertation focused on how proteins are produced from RNA in poliovirus.
In 1973, while still a graduate student at MIT, she became a founding member of SACNAS and completed her PhD in cell biology in 1975.
She then attended Harvard for three years of postdoctoral research, emphasizing recombinant DNA technology.
Despite facing repeated failures in her experiments during this time, she learned that “most experiments fail, and that scientists must accept failure as part of the process.”
These experiences contributed to her significant success: six months after returning to Harvard (following the lifting of the ban on recombinant DNA experiments in 1977), she became a postdoctoral fellow in the lab of Nobel laureate Walter Gilbert.
Within six months, she became the first author of a landmark report from the Gilbert lab, demonstrating that bacteria could be induced to produce proinsulin, marking the first time bacteria synthesized a mammalian hormone. This research was pivotal in the development of the biotechnology industry.
Later that year, she joined the faculty at the University of Massachusetts Medical School, where she served as a professor for six years before achieving tenure. She subsequently moved to Harvard Medical School, attracted by a lighter teaching workload and more research opportunities.
There, she focused on transforming growth factor-α and epidermal growth factor during fetal and neonatal development, with key findings published in 1992 and 1993.
Villa-Komaroff established her reputation in molecular biology, and in 1995, her work on insulin-related growth factors was featured in a PBS documentary series titled “Discovering Women.”
In 1996, Villa-Komaroff left laboratory research to become vice president for research at Northwestern University.
In 2003, she returned to Boston as the chief operating officer of the Whitehead Institute for Biomedical Research, an affiliated institute of MIT.
Since 2005, she has held senior executive and board member positions in several biotechnology companies, while also serving on the boards and committees of various major public and private institutions.
Are you considering postgraduate study?
The Society for the Advancement of Chicanos and Native Americans in Science (SACNAS) Tribal College and University Virtual Chapter has announced that it will host monthly meetings on the first Wednesday of every month.
These meetings offer a chance for students from tribal colleges and universities to connect.
The chapter is open to currently enrolled students, TCU faculty, and staff. Students who register will receive a free one-year SACNAS student membership, while TCU faculty and staff who sign up will be granted a SACNAS community membership.
📅 Celebrate #NPAW2025 with SACNAS Sept 15–19! This year’s theme is communicating your science and research 🧪📢. Join us for a week of connection, learning, and celebration of SACNISTA postdocs.
See the full agenda + register here 👉 https://t.co/3EEcdweeM0 pic.twitter.com/9oPUf7i5Cf— SACNAS (@SACNAS) September 5, 2025
📣 Postdocs, we see you and we want to celebrate you! 💫 #NPAW2025 is Sept 15–19 and we’re highlighting postdocs doing incredible work in #STEM. Want to be featured? Fill out the form! 🔗 https://t.co/etxXliH8X5#nationalpostdoc #SACNAS pic.twitter.com/Nax5q6wkZ0
— SACNAS (@SACNAS) August 11, 2025
Lydia Villa-Komaroff is a trailblazer in the field of molecular biology who, despite opposition, discovered that bacteria could be engineered to produce human insulin. She is now the Chief Scientific Officer at Cytonome/ST. We recognize her this week on #WomenWhoChangedTheWorld. pic.twitter.com/7NeTmMe1DB
— Cactus Communications (@Cactusglobal) January 20, 2023
Lydia Villa-Komaroff was on the research team that, for the first time, demonstrated bacteria could be genetically engineered to produce insulin—a discovery that transformed diabetes treatment and saved millions of lives worldwide.#hispanicheritagemonth #womeninSTEM pic.twitter.com/SoM4CwgggR
— Honest History (@honest_history) October 14, 2024
The U.S. Army Corps of Engineers has been tasked with…
Brown and Caldwell, a leading environmental engineering and construction firm,…
Humboldt State University, one of four campuses within the California…
