Geographical classification

Europe > Spain

Socio-cultural movements

Groups by dedication

Scientists > Chemists

Writers > Essayists

Character
Imagen

Pilar Mateo Herrero

València 1959

Period of activity: From 1995 until Still active

Geographical classification: Europe > Spain

Socio-cultural movements

Groups by dedication

Scientists > Chemists

Writers > Essayists

Context of feminine creation

Pilar Mateo's scientific and research activity has been driven for years by the need to put Science at the service of people who need it. She shares, with other scientists like Eleanor Omerod (1828-1901) , her interest in solving problems caused by insects to indigenous communities (in the case of Pilar Mateo), or ranchers and farmers (in the case of Eleanor Omerod).
Pilar Mateo is one of the many Spanish scientists, among whom are Alicia Calderón, a physicist who participated in the discovery of the Higgs Boson, Elena García Armada, creator of the bionic exoskeleton called Atlas 2020, or Mara Dierssen, an expert in neurobiology and pharmacology, considered at the forefront of international research.

Precursors of Pilar Mateo were Rachel Carson (1907-1964), marine biologist, zoologist and writer, who concluded after several studies that pesticides were destroying the environment, the conservationist Beatrix Potter and the nature photographer, writer and ecologist Jane Stratton-Porter. Shirley Briggs, as well as being an ornithologist and naturalist, collaborated in her work as a photographer.  
The scientist Theo Colborn continued to research and publish on toxic chemicals, extending Rachel Carson's legacy. Frances Oldham Kelsey, a contemporary and connoisseur of Carson's work, worked in pharmacological medicine and prevented the use of thalidomide in the USA, which prevented the tragedy that occurred in other countries.

Review

She patented a paint for houses that incorporates a microencapsulation technology that allows delayed release of an insecticide for up to 18 months. In this way, painting can eliminate bedbugs whose bites transmit Trypanosoma Cruzi, a protozoan that causes Chagas disease, associated with poverty. The disease, transmitted by the bite of the bug that in Bolivia is called vinchuca, affects around 25 million people, although more than 100 million are susceptible to it.

Justifications

  • She is the inventor of a paint, InesFly, which kills insects such as those that cause Chagas disease.
  • It currently has 8 families of patents in more than 100 countries around the world, including the United States and the European Union.

Biography

Pilar Mateo's father had a varnish factory. The curiosity that she manifested since she was a child, her interest in inventing things and the desire to collaborate in the family business seem to be the factors that led her to study Chemical Sciences at the University of Valencia. She has a Doctorate in Chemical Sciences from the Higher Council for Scientific Research and from the University of Valencia, Doctor Honoris Causa from the Anáhuac University of Mexico. She specialised in metallic and electrochemical corrosion and has focused her scientific activity on the development of high-tech products with her own polymeric microencapsulation technique, in the laboratories of her family business.
For about 14 years she became aware of the importance of putting research and science at the service of those most in need. This led her to live with various indigenous communities in Latin America, to realise that only by sharing those needs could she try to help them and find a way to solve the diseases that affect them, such as Chagas. The microencapsulation patent developed by Pilar Mateo consists of a resinous paint called Inesfly that incorporates chitin inhibitors or growth regulators, and it is effective in directly controlling the presence of arthropods and the diseases they transmit.

Works

  • B.Roncero-Ramosa, M.A.Muñoz-Martín, Y.Cantóna, S.Chamizoa, E.Rodríguez Caballero, P.Mateo. Land degradation effects on composition of pioneering soil communities: An alternative successional sequence for dryland cyanobacterial biocrusts. Soil Biology and Biochemistry. Volume 146, July 2020, pp: 1-27 
     
  • Smail Mehda, M. Ángeles Muñoz-Martín, Mabrouka Oustani, Baelhadj Hamdi-Aïssa, Elvira Perona, Pilar Mateo. Lithic cyanobacterial communities in the polyextreme Sahara Desert: implications for the search for the limits of life. 
     
  • Pilar Mateo, M. Ángeles Muñoz-Martín, Esther Berrendero, Elvira Perona & Brian A. Whitton. Influence of phosphate on Nostochopsis-like morphology (Cyanobacteria). Phycologya. Volume 59, 2020. Pp: 540-550  

Bibliography

Didactic approach

-Biology-geology 3rd of ESO.
-Biology-geology 4th of ESO.
-Perhaps she could be a scientist to be reckoned with in areas such as Chemistry or Technology.

Documents