TV icon Mary Tyler Moore has passed away at the age of 80.

TMZ reported that Moore was "suffering from a number of health problems and recently it has become critical." The TV legend was diagnosed with Type 1 diabetes in 1966 and underwent brain surgery in 2011.

Moore first became famous on The Dick Van Dyke show, playing Laura Petrie for all five seasons of the beloved sitcom. From 1970 to 1977 she starred in her own sitcom, The Mary Tyler Moore Show which many TV critics still hail as one of the greatest television series of all time.

The sitcom was one of the first to feature a gay character. In the third season episode entitled "My Brother's Keeper" Phyllis' brother comes to town, and Rhoda reveals to her that he is gay, in a groundbreaking—and hilarious—scene.

She guest starred as her character, Mary Richards, on two of the series' spinoffs, Rhoda and Phyllis. Valerie Harper and Moore even reprised their roles in the 2001 TV movie, Mary and Rhoda—which was supposed to be a potential pilot for a new series about the two best friends.

Moore won seven Emmys over the course of her TV career, and even snagged an Oscar nomination for Best Actress when she starred as Beth in Robert Redford's directorial debut, Ordinary People in 1980.

In recent years Moore would pop up in guest roles on various sitcoms such as The Naked Truth, The Ellen Show and Hot in Cleveland.

Moore was not only an actress but also an animals activist. “I love them all! Even those animals for whom I have no particular feeling- like snakes or alligators or any of the creepy crawly fellows," she told L.A.'s Pet Press. "I still care very much about them and would never tolerate inhumane treatment to them.”

She made headlines in 1995 when she was involved with PETA and their "Free the Lobsters!" campaign. Moore was vocal about being a vegetarian and treating animals kindly.

In 1983 Moore married her third husband, physician Robert Levine. Her second husband, Grant Tinker—whom she started her production company, MTM Enterprises with—passed away last year at the age of 90.

In 2002 TV Land unveiled a statue of Moore in Minneapolis in the spot where she threw her hat in the hair during the iconic opening credits of The Mary Tyler Moore Show. Moore was honored with a Screen Actors Guild Lifetime Achievement Award in 2012.

The impact of Moore as a single, career driven woman starring in her own series was widely felt, even influencing future media moguls such as Oprah Winfrey who called her "an inspiration to women in television."

To see a small sample of Moore's comedic acting watch the funeral scene from the classic episode of The Mary Tyler Moore Show, "Chuckles Bites the Dust" below.