Leading Figure in Retrovirus Research
Flossie Wong-Staal *1946–2020
Virologist and molecular biologist Flossie Wong-Staal, born Wong Yee-Ching in Guangzhou, China, in 1946, fled to Hong Kong with her family in 1952 after the Communist revolution. She excelled at a Catholic girls‘ school where her teachers encouraged her to study in the U.S. and adopt an English name. Her father suggested „Flossie“ after a recent typhoon.
At 18, she moved to the U.S. and obtained a B.Sc. in bacteriology and a Ph.D. in molecular biology from the University of California, Los Angeles. There she married fellow student Stephen Staal, with whom she had two daughters. In 1973, she joined Robert Gallo‘s laboratory at the National Cancer Institute and helped discover the first human retrovirus, HTLV-1. By 1982, she was head of the Molecular Genetics of Hematopoietic Cells. She confirmed HIV as the cause of AIDS and was the first to clone the virus in 1985. In 1990, she founded the Centre for AIDS Research at the University of California, San Diego, and pioneered gene therapy for viruses.
With more than 400 publications, she has advanced the understanding of retroviruses and the treatment of HIV/AIDS. In 2002, she co-founded Immusol, a biopharmaceutical company focused on the treatment of hepatitis C. For that, has received numerous awards, including induction into the US National Women‘s Hall of Fame. Flossie Wong-Staal, who was also a passionate ballroom dancer, died in 2020 at the age of 73.