María de los Ángeles Alvariño González (Spanish pronunciation: [maˈɾia ðe los ˈaŋxeles alβaˈɾiɲo ɣonˈθaleθ], October 3, 1916 – May 29, 2005), known as Ángeles Alvariño, was a Spanish fishery research biologist and oceanographer globally recognized as an authority in plankton biology. She was the first woman ever appointed as scientist aboard any British or Spanish exploration ship. She discovered 22 new species of marine animals and published over a hundred scientific books, essays, and articles. In her late career she studied the history of early marine scientific exploration.
Early days María de los Ángeles Alvariño Gonzalez was born in Serantes (Ferrol, Galicia), Spain on October 3, 1916, the daughter of Antonio Alvariño Grimaldos, a physician, and Maria del Carmen Gonzales Diaz-Saavedra de Alvariño. From an early age she showed an interest in the natural sciences and read her father's book on zoology. She attended the lycée Concepcion Arenal in Ferrol and in 1931 attended the University of Santiago de Compostela where she graduated summa cum laude in 1933. The titles of her dissertations were "Social Insects" and "Women in Don Quixote". "Creativity and imagination are the basic ingredients for the scientists, as in the arts, because science is an art…" she later explained when she was asked about her diverse interests. In 1934, she was admitted at the Complutense University of Madrid to study Natural Sciences, but had to interrupt her studies as a consequence of the Spanish Civil War. During this period, she devoted herself to the study of English and French, which later proved to be very useful for the development of her research career in the United States. In 1940, she married Eugenio Leira Manso, captain of the Spanish War Navy and Knight of the Royal and Military Order of Saint Hermenegild. Two years later, their daughter was born, Maria de los Angeles Leira Alvariño, who is now a well-renowned architect and urbanist based in the US. After the Civil War, Ángeles Alvariño resumed her studies, and in 1941, she earned her master's degree in Natural Sciences by the University of Madrid. Ángeles Álvariño returned with her husband to Ferrol where, from 1941 to 1948, she taught biology, zoology, botany, and geology as a professor at various schools. In 1948, she moved back with her family to Madrid to work as a fishery research biologist with the Department of Sea Fisheries. Alvariño could not pursue further research studies at the Spanish Institute of Oceanography in Madrid due to a dated Spanish law that prohibited women aboard Spanish naval vessels. However, because she had outstanding academic credentials, she was allowed to take some courses and do some research. In 1951, she received a graduate diploma in Experimental Psychology, Analytical Chemistry and Plant Ecology from the Complutense University of Madrid. In 1950, she moved back to Galicia and worked at the Spanish Oceanographic Institute in Vigo. In 1953, she received a scholarship from the British Council to conduct research on zooplankton in the Marine Biological Association laboratory at Plymouth, England, under the direction of the well-respected experts in zooplankton Frederick S. Russell and Peter C. Corbin. Zooplankton comprise the small floating animals in the ocean that serve as food for other animals and include jellyfish, coral, and sea anemones. These creatures had barely been studied before the 1960s, and she focused in three groups: the microscopic Chaetognatha, which are carnivorous and feed on other plankton; the colonial Siphonophore, which cluster in groups of individuals of the same species (like the Portuguese Man'o'War); and the medusa or jellyfish. By studying the plankton of the English Channel and in the Bay of Biscay, her work led to the discovery of some anomalies in the distribution of plankton species which led to the scientific conclusion that the Atlantic waters had moved poleward in an unusual way. María de los Ángeles Alvariño was the first woman to be appointed as scientist aboard a British research vessel. Throughout her life, she participated in several expeditions and scientific cruises in the Atlantic and Pacific, aboard oceanographic ships from England, America, Spain and Mexico. In 1954, Alvariño returned to Spain to continue her research on zooplankton. She designed special nets and recruited fishermen and naval research vessels to sample plankton for her in the Atlantic near Spain and near Newfoundland, and in the Mediterranean.
In Mexico Alvariño collaborated with the then National Institute of Fisheries (Now IMIPAS) on behalf of the United Nations Food and Agriculture Organization to train the institute's initial staff, including Maria Concepcion Rodriguez de la Cruz, among others.
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