Renata Maas

April 8, 2020

On Wednesday, April 8, 2020, Renata Diringer Maas passed away at the age of 87. Renata was born on March 12, 1933 in Vienna, Austria to Jacob and Selma Diringer, At the age of 2, Renata and her parents emigrated to Buenos Aires, joining other family members also fleeing the threat of Nazi persecution. Long after moving to Toronto in 1947, Renata maintained her ties to Buenos Aires and her beloved Argentine family with visits, letters, and sharing her love of the culture with family here in the US. Upon graduating high school in Toronto (‘50) with top honors in the province, Renata attended University of Toronto where she studied Mathematics, Biochemistry and French. She received her doctorate also from U of Toronto (‘59) for which her thesis was entitled ‘Chemical and Metabolic Studies of DNA’. Renata completed her post doc in NYC, and after taking time to raise her children, resumed her career in the late 1970’s. With genuine interest and passion for her field, Renata resiliently continued her research at NYU for more than two decades, and in 2005 published a paper in Cell Magazine focusing on DNA methylation and replication. Renata spoke at conferences worldwide and her conversations about her work and DNA continued to the present day. Renata’s passion for life and learning carried far beyond her accomplishments in science. She used her talents in languages whenever possible to connect with people she met whether it was Spanish, Portuguese, French, German, or Polish. Her understanding of the need for precision and detail from science carried over to cooking, and she created delicious gourmet meals representing cultures from across the globe. As long as she was able to, Renata also maintained a wonderful herb and vegetable garden. It is fair to say that everyone loved partaking in a meal prepared by Renata. Renata truly enjoyed spending time with those she loved. And Renata was a storyteller. Reminiscing about her experiences growing up and working in science, she always knew how to hold her audience’s attention. Renata also loved to hear from others. She always wanted to know what was happening with the people she cared most about in her life and throughout her life prided herself on making connections between her life and others. For the past 4 months, Renata has profoundly missed her husband, Werner, who passed away in November. Together they created a life full of meaning for each other. Their lives centered around both family and shared careers. They shared a love for travel and as they traveled the world they were always interested in what they discovered. But the place they loved most of all, where they felt the most comfortable, was their home in Hastings-on-Hudson. Passionate, unique and fascinating with a beautiful smile; Renata will be remembered for all this and more. Renata is preceded in death by her husband, Werner. She is survived by three children, Peter, Andrew and Helen and four grandchildren, Max, Willa, Sophie and David. For the past six months Renata had been bravely undergoing treatment for Acute Myeloid Leukemia, until sadly she succumbed to Covid 19. In lieu of flowers the family is asking that contributions in her name be made to the Cancer Research Institute at cancerresearch.org.