Hay, Elizabeth Dexter (1927–)
Hay, Elizabeth Dexter (1927–)
American cell biologist. Born Elizabeth Dexter Hay, April 2, 1927, in St. Augustine, Florida; dau. of a physician (father); had twin brother Jack Hay (died 1942); Smith College, AB, 1948; Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine, MD, 1952; never married; no children.
Embryologist and anatomist, who initially studied cancer cells and birth defects (e.g., cleft plate); worked with Dr. S. Meryl Rose at Smith College and, during summers, at Marine Biological Institute at Woods Hole, MA; was assistant anatomy professor at Cornell Medical College (1957–60); was assistant anatomy professor at Harvard Medical School (1960–64), becoming full embryology professor (1969), then chair of Department of Anatomy and Cellular Biology (1975–93), Harvard's 1st woman chair of an academic department; with Jean-Paul Revel at Harvard University, successfully applied auto-radiography to the electron microscope and wrote a monograph on developing avian cornea (considered a classic); studied eye tissues and collagen. Elected to National Academy of Sciences (1984); received Alcon Award for Vision Research (1988) and New York Academy of Sciences' Salute to Contemporary Women Scientists Award (1991).