She was granted the Nobel Prize in "Physiology or Medicine " (divided with her collaborator Stanley Cohen) for the discovery of the "Nerve Growth Factor", simplified later in NGF, in Stockholm in 1986.

The Nerve Growth Factor is a protein nucleus fraction that has revealed itself to be very important for the understanding and the knowledge of the nervous system and other vital functions.

Rita Levi Montalcini obtained her Degree in Medicine in 1936, a few years later she fell victim to anti-Jewish racial laws that prevented her from carrying out the medical profession, hence her decision to dedicate herself to research.

Back in Turin in 1945, after living the years of war in Florence, she accepts Professor Hamburger of "Washington University" in St. Louis’ invitation to go to the United States for a few months: she will remain there 30 years.

She leaves in 1947 and stays until 1977, carrying out research that will lead her to the discovery of the NGF. During the thirty years she spends in America she often returns to Italy where she funds, in Rome, a "Cell Biology Laboratory " – directing it for 10 years – which in 1969  becomes an official organ of the CNR (National Research Council).

At the end of the 80s, after she receives the Nobel prize, Rita Levi Montalcini writes her autobiography to which she gives a fascinating and significant title: "In Praise of Imperfection".

In this work she tells her professional and private life, her successes and disappointments, the relationships that have had a weight in her existence like Professor Giuseppe Levi (her teacher and friend), Renato Dulbecco – Nobel prize in 1975 – and Salvador Luria - Nobel prize 1969 – dear friends ever since University.

The history of a woman that was able to find her way and her dimension in a world that had just left war, having the courage of leaving her own country and her own roots to move to the other side of the world, a woman who has lived and worked for others’ “good”.

In 2001 she receives from President of the Republic Carlo Azeglio Ciampi the nomination as Senator for life, for her very high merits in the scientific and social field.