Maria Branyas Morera lived an extraordinary life that spanned more than a century and bridged eras most people today can only imagine.

Born on March 4, 1907, in San Francisco, California, Branyas moved with her Catalan family to Catalonia, Spain when she was just a young girl in 1915.

There, she would spend the rest of her remarkable life, witnessing the seismic shifts of the 20th and early 21st centuries — from global conflicts to medical revolutions and technological transformations that reshaped how we live, work, and age.

When she died on August 19, 2024, at the age of 117 years and 168 days, Maria Branyas Morera held the distinction of being the world’s oldest verified living person, recognized by the Gerontology Research Group and Guinness World Records.

She also became one of the longest‑lived humans in documented history, placing her among an elite group of supercentenarians whose lives defy typical biological expectations.

But Branyas’s story was not only astonishing for its length.

It was also inspiring for its quality, its resilience, and the profound lessons it offered about how humans can age — not merely survive, but live with clarity, engagement, and purpose almost to the very end.

A Life That Spanned Worlds

When Maria Branyas was born in 1907, the world was dramatically different from today.

She entered life in a period before commercial airplanes, antibiotics, or radio broadcasts were widespread. She lived through:

World War I and its aftermath.

The Spanish Civil War and the rise of fascism in Europe.

World War II and its global reshaping of politics and society.

The Great Depression and massive economic upheavals.

Major medical breakthroughs, including the creation of vaccines and treatments for once‑fatal diseases.

The COVID‑19 pandemic, which Branyas survived at age 113 — becoming one of the oldest documented survivors of the virus.

She bore witness not only to world history but also to a litany of technological revolutions — from cars and airplanes to satellites and the internet — a span of progress that few individuals have ever seen firsthand.

Yet through all this change, she maintained a grounded life. For decades, Branyas lived in the Santa Maria del Tura nursing home in Olot, a town in the Catalan region of northeastern Spain, surrounded by family, friends, and caregivers.

There she stayed active, mentally engaged, and socially connected — key aspects of her long life that she often credited alongside genetics and lifestyle habits.

A Woman Who Asked to Be Studied

Unlike most people whose lives end quietly and privately, Maria Branyas Morera approached the end of her life with curiosity and generosity

. She understood that her biology might hold insights for science and for others who aspire to long, healthy lives.

Before her death, she explicitly expressed a wish that doctors study her body and biology in depth, hoping that lessons from her physiology could benefit others.

Her request was granted, and an international research effort was undertaken — one of the most comprehensive scientific examinations ever conducted on an individual supercentenarian.

Teams led by experts at the University of Barcelona and the Josep Carreras Leukaemia Research Institute analysed her genome, metabolome, microbiome, blood biomarkers, cellular age markers, and more.

Their findings, published in Cell Reports Medicine, were both remarkable and deeply instructive.

The lead scientist involved, Dr. Manel Esteller, emphasized that Branyas’s life challenged assumptions about aging. Traditionally, extreme age is equated with frailty, chronic illness, and cognitive decline.

But Maria’s biology suggested something different: it showed that advanced age and serious disease are not intrinsically linked in all cases.