Univ. Prof. Dr. Margit Pavelka (*1945 – †2022)

With great regret we have to inform you that Prof. Margit Pavelka passed away unexpectedly.

Margit Pavelka has been an active member and leading figure of the Society for Histochemistry for many years. From 2001 to 2003 she was President of the Society.

Margit Pavelka started her career in Vienna as medical doctor specializing in internal medicine. Very soon she changed her focus to cell biological topics. In 1987 she obtained the Venia docendi (“Habilitation”) with the treatise “Functional morphology of the Golgi apparatus”. From then on she dedicated her research to the Golgi apparatus with the main focus on ultrastructural aspects. From her appointment to full professor in 1992 Margit Pavelka headed the Institute for Histology and Embryology at the Leopold-Franzens-University in Innsbruck and later the Center of Anatomy and Cell Biology at the Medical University of Vienna until her retirement in 2013. Even as professor emeritus she still was active in research, published her results, organized meetings and shared her knowledge at many conferences.

Margit Pavelka was dedicated to her work and enlarged substantially the knowledge on structure and function of the Golgi apparatus. In particular, she pioneered three-dimensional investigation of the dynamics of Golgi stacks. In addition to her many scientific achievements one of her main concerns was the support of students and young scientists in pursuit of their career. She was a dedicated teacher and always had an open ear for questions and problems of young colleagues.

Apart from her Presidency of the Society for Histochemistry, she has been part of the Robert Feulgen Prize Committee evaluating applications for the prize. Furthermore, she acted as editor of the Histochemistry and Cell Biology journal up to now.

With her death we have lost a colleague as well as a friend. We will miss her.

Society for Histochemistry