amfAR, The Foundation for AIDS Research, is an international nonprofit organization dedicated to the support of AIDS research, HIV prevention, treatment education, and the advocacy of sound AIDS-related public policy.

In the early 1980s, a group of researchers and scientists including Mathilde Krim, Ph.D., then a researcher at New York's Memorial Sloan-Kettering Cancer Center, formed an informal study group to investigate the condition that came to be known as AIDS. In 1983, Dr. Krim, Dr. Joseph Sonnabend, Michael Callen, and several others launched the New York-based AIDS Medical Foundation. In Los Angeles, Dr. Michael S. Gottlieb and Dame Elizabeth Taylor spearheaded the creation of the National AIDS Research Foundation. The two organizations merged in September 1985 to become american foundation for AIDS Research (amfAR).

When amfAR was founded, Dr. Krim and Dr. Gottlieb were named Founding Chairmen and Dame Elizabeth Taylor became Founding National Chairman. Twenty-five years later, amfAR remains one of the world's leading organizations dedicated to fighting the AIDS epidemic, and has invested more than $340 million in support of its mission.

Sharon Vonne Stone (born March 10, 1958) is an American actress, film producer, and former fashion model. She achieved international recognition for her role in the erotic thriller Basic Instinct. She was nominated for an Academy Award for Best Actress and won a Golden Globe Award for Best Actress in a Motion Picture Drama for her performance in Casino.

Stone was born in Meadville, Pennsylvania. The second of four children, she is the daughter of Dorothy (née Lawson), an accountant and homemaker, and Joseph William Stone II, a tool and die manufacturer and factory worker. Stone graduated in 1975 from Saegertown High School in Saegertown, Pennsylvania.

Stone won the title of Miss Crawford County in Meadville, and was a candidate for Miss Pennsylvania. One of the pageant judges said she should quit school and move to New York City to become a fashion model. In 1977, Stone left Meadville, moving in with an aunt in New Jersey. Within four days of her arrival in New Jersey, she was signed by Ford Modeling Agency in New York.

Solange Piaget Knowles (born June 24, 1986), who performs under the mononym Solange, is an American singer-songwriter, actress, model, dancer, and DJ. Knowles was born and raised in Houston, Texas along with her older sister singer Beyoncé. Showing an interest in music recording at an early age, she eventually broke into the music scene at 16. She has released two studios albums: Solo Star in 2003 and Sol-Angel and the Hadley St. Dreams in 2008, which peaked at number nine in the US Billboard 200 chart.

Aside from recording, Knowles has ventured into film, modeling, and entrepreneurship. Knowles has been compared to her sister by the media, but she dismisses the notion, saying they are artistically different.

Knowles was born in Houston, Texas, to Mathew Knowles and Tina Knowles. Solange is the second child of Mathew and Tina, and the younger sister of Beyoncé. Her father is African American and her mother is Creole (of African, Native American, and French descent) and Irish descent. Her maternal grandparents are Lumis Beyincé and Agnéz Deréon, (a seamstress). She is also a descendant of Acadian leader Joseph Broussard. As a child, Knowles studied dance and theater. At the age of five, she made her singing debut at an amusement park. She began writing songs at the age of nine. At 13, she decided to pursue recording, but her parents initially advised her to wait. At the age of 15 Knowles replaced a departed dancer and performed with her sister's group Destiny's Child on tour. During the group's opening stint for American pop singer Christina Aguilera's tour, Knowles temporarily replaced Destiny's Child member Kelly Rowland after Kelly broke her toes backstage during a costume change. When Knowles was 16, her father, who was then also her manager, signed her to his recording company, Music World Entertainment.

Irina Shayk (sometimes credited as Irina Sheik, born Irina Shaykhlislamova on January 6, 1986 in Yemanzhelinsk, Russia) is a Russian model known for her 2007 through 2012 appearances in the Sports Illustrated Swimsuit Issue. She was the cover model for the 2011 issue.

Shayk was born in Yemanzhelinsk, Russia. She says she inherited her unusual looks from her father and she has said that people often think she is South American. “My father was dark skinned, because he was Tatar, sometimes Tatars can look Brazilian,” she says. “I get my light eyes from my mother.” Shayk’s mother was a pianist who was the music teacher in a kindergarten and her father was a coal miner. She has one sibling, an older sister named Tatiana. Shayk started playing piano at age six. At age nine she enrolled in a music school and studied there for seven years, both playing the piano and singing in the choir since her mother wanted her to study music. Her father died of complications of pneumonia when she was 14, leaving her family with little money and forcing her mother to work two jobs to provide for the family.

Alessandra Corine Ambrósio (Portuguese pronunciation: [aleˈsɐ̃dɾɐ ɐ̃ˈbɾɔzju]; born April 11, 1981) is a Brazilian model. Ambrosio is best known for her work with Victoria's Secret and was chosen as the first spokesmodel for the company's "PINK" line. Ambrosio is currently one of the Victoria's Secret Angels and has modeled for brands such as Next, Armani Exchange, Christian Dior, and Ralph Lauren.

Aside from modeling work, Ambrosio serves as an ambassador for the National Multiple Sclerosis Society. Ambrosio was also selected by AskMen.com as Number 2 out of the "Top 99 Most Desirable Women of 2008".

Ambrosio was born in Erechim, Brazil on April 11, 1981. Her parents, who are of Italian and Polish Brazilian descent, own a petrol station. Ambrósio was just eight years old when she decided that she wanted to be a model, after seeing a picture of top covergirl Karen Mulder in a magazine: "I wanted to be like her", she recalls.^{[citation needed]} She enrolled at a modelling class at the age of 12 and at the age of 14 she was one of 20 finalists for an elite modelling competition in Brazil. Ambrosio was always insecure about her large ears and at eleven had cosmetic surgery to get her ears pinned back, though two years later she suffered complications. In 2006, she appeared on The Tyra Banks Show, and said that the surgery was a bad experience and has discouraged her from ever getting plastic surgery again.