Our Kicking Ass Space

Rita Levi-Montalcini, a trailblazing Italian neurologist, overcame significant adversity, including the anti-Semitic laws of Fascist Italy, to make one of the 20th century’s most profound scientific discoveries. Working with her colleague, Stanley Cohen, she identified Nerve Growth Factor (NGF)—a soluble protein released by target tissues that is essential for the survival, maintenance, and growth of specific nerve cells. This groundbreaking finding, which earned them the 1986 Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine, revolutionized neurobiology and established the entirely new field of growth factors, fundamentally changing our understanding of how the nervous system develops.