Giuliana Tesoro (née Cavaglieri) (June 1, 1921–September 29, 2002) was an Italian-born American chemist who earned more than 125 patents, with her most notable consisting of improvements in fabric comfort, practicality, and flame resistance.

Her parents were wealthy Jewish people with college degrees, and the prestige certainly carried over to Tesoro who began third grade at the early age of six.

Unfortunately, she was denied entrance into any Italian school due to her Jewish identity, as the nation’s fascist ideas forbade Jews from attending higher education.

That did not stop Tesoro, who traveled to Geneva, Switzerland to obtain an x-ray technician diploma, and eventually to the United States to further her studies in chemistry.

In 1969, she accepted a position as a senior chemist at Burlington Industries and was appointed director of chemical research in 1971, where she was a prolific inventor, having been granted more than two dozen patents in 1970, alone.

In prior times, people would wear clothing from natural material like cotton, which is highly flammable, and not suited for high-risk situations like firefighter emergencies, or simply a car’s tires running along a roadway creating friction rapidly.