Renée Schroeder

Renée Schroeder (born 18 May 1953, in João Monlevade, Brazil) is an Austrian researcher and university professor at the Department of Biochemistry at the Max F. Perutz Laboratories of the University of Vienna and the Medical University of Vienna.

Life
Renée Schroeder was born on Brazil where her father worked as an electrical engineer. They left Brazil when she was 14.

Her research is in the field of biochemistry, especially on RNA (ribonucleic acid). From June 2001 to November 2005, she was on the Bioethics Commission, launched by the Austrian government. From 2005 to 2010, she was Vice-President of the Fund for Scientific Research and in 2010 member of the Council for Research and Technology Development since September. She has also repeatedly been critical of the Austrian education and research policy. In particular, she criticized discrimination against women within the university structures, so she is particularly involved in the promotion of women in science. This long-lasting commitment earned her the 2001 Special Honor Award "For Women in Science", donated by UNESCO and the company L'Oreal, and in 2007, she was awarded the Vienna Women's Prize (Wiener Frauenpreis). Schroeder also spoke frequently about the church and religion as well as about women and their worldview.

In 2003, Schroeder was elected the second woman member of the Division of Mathematics and the Natural Sciences of the Austrian Academy of Sciences. In May 2012, Renée Schroeder resigned from the Academy, to protest the lack of promotion of excellence and the high proportion of Catholic German Student Fraternity members in the Academy.

On September 1, 2022, she was appointed honorary senator at the University of Vienna because of her "outstanding commitment to the university and to the fulfillment of its scientific tasks."

Awards & Honours

 * 1984: Theodor Körner Prize
 * 2001 Special Honour Award "For Women in Science"
 * 2002 Austrian Scientist of the Year (elected by the Austrian Science Journalists).
 * 2003 Wittgenstein Award
 * 2005 Prize of the City of Vienna for Natural and Technical Sciences
 * 2006 Grand Decoration of Honour for Services to the Republic of Austria
 * 2007 Vienna Women's Prize (Wiener Frauenpreis)
 * 2011 Eduard Buchner Prize
 * 2012 Austrian Science Book of the Year 2012 Award, category Medicine and Biology, for Die Henne und das Ei. Auf der Suche nach dem Ursprung des Lebens (The Hen and the Egg. In search of the origin of life)
 * 2015 Golden Decoration of Honour for Services to the Province of Vienna
 * 2017 Austrian Science Book of the Year 2017 Award for Die Erfindung des Menschen: Wie wir die Evolution überlisten (The invention of man: How we outwit evolution)
 * 2022 Honorary senator (Ehrensenatorin) at the University of Vienna