Jakub Karol Parnas: Pioneer of Glycolysis and Biochemical Research

Jakub Karol Parnas, also known as Yakov Oskarovich Parnas, was a prominent biochemist whose work left an enduring mark on the field of biochemistry. Born on January 16, 1884, in Tarnopol, which was then part of Austria-Hungary (now Ternopil, Ukraine), Parnas's scientific journey began with his education at the Königlich Technische Hochschule Charlottenburg and ETH Zurich, two of the premier technical institutes in Europe at the time. These institutions provided him with a solid foundation in biochemistry, a field that was still developing rapidly during the early 20th century. His academic training equipped him to make groundbreaking contributions, particularly in the area of carbohydrate metabolism.

Parnas’s most notable contribution to science is his role in elucidating the Embden-Meyerhof-Parnas pathway, an essential metabolic route that plays a central role in glycolysis. This pathway describes the series of reactions that break down glucose to produce energy in cells, a process fundamental to cellular respiration in both animals and humans. Understanding this pathway was critical for advancements in fields such as medicine and physiology, particularly in relation to muscle function and energy metabolism. Parnas's collaboration with Władysław Baranowski led to the discovery of phosphorolysis, a crucial step in glycolysis, demonstrating the chemical reactions by which muscle tissue converts glycogen into usable energy.

From 1920 to 1941, Parnas was the director of the Institute of Medical Chemistry at Lviv University, where he spearheaded important research into carbohydrate metabolism in muscle tissue. His work was of immense importance, not only advancing scientific understanding but also influencing practical applications in medicine. During World War II, Parnas chose to stay in Lviv after the Soviet annexation of Western Ukraine, and he later moved further into Soviet territory following the German invasion of 1941. His expertise and reputation earned him a prominent position within Soviet science, where he even met Soviet leader Joseph Stalin and was provided with his own laboratory to continue his research.

Despite these accomplishments, Parnas's life ended in tragedy. In 1949, amid the political purges associated with the Jewish Anti-Fascist Committee affair, he was arrested by the KGB. He died in prison under mysterious circumstances, reportedly from a heart attack, although the exact cause remains unclear. Parnas’s death was a great loss to the scientific community, but his legacy has endured through his over 180 published scientific works in multiple languages. His research has had a lasting impact, particularly on the understanding of glycolysis, solidifying his place as one of the most influential biochemists of his time.
Jakub Karol Parnas: Pioneer of Glycolysis and Biochemical Research

Otto Fritz Meyerhof: Nobel Laureate and Pioneer of Muscle Metabolism

Otto Fritz Meyerhof, born on April 12, 1884, in Hanover, Germany, was a distinguished physician and biochemist whose research significantly advanced our understanding of muscle metabolism. He is best known for his groundbreaking work on the biochemical processes underlying cellular respiration, for which he was awarded the Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine in 1922. His Nobel was shared with British physiologist Archibald V. Hill, with Meyerhof recognized for elucidating the biochemical relationship between oxygen consumption and lactic acid production in muscles.

Meyerhof’s early life was marked by a strong intellectual environment. His family moved to Berlin in 1888, where he completed his early education, developing an interest in both medicine and the sciences. He pursued his higher education in medical studies at several universities, including the University of Strasbourg and the University of Heidelberg, where he earned his M.D. in 1909. Though his doctoral thesis explored the psychological theory of mental illness, Meyerhof soon became captivated by biochemistry, a field that was rapidly growing in importance at the time.

In 1912, Meyerhof accepted a position at the University of Kiel, where he began his influential research on muscle physiology. His focus was on glycolysis, the process by which glucose is broken down to produce energy within cells. Meyerhof's work, particularly his exploration of the interplay between oxygen and lactic acid in muscle tissues, laid the foundation for what is now referred to as the Embden-Meyerhof pathway. This pathway, named in part after Meyerhof, describes the crucial series of enzymatic reactions that enable cells to produce energy anaerobically.

Unfortunately, Meyerhof’s promising career in Germany was disrupted by the rise of the Nazi regime. As a Jew, he faced increasing persecution, leading him to flee Germany in 1938. He initially sought refuge in Paris but eventually moved to the United States in 1940, where he joined the University of Pennsylvania. There, he continued his research until his death on October 6, 1951, in Philadelphia. Meyerhof's legacy endures in the fields of biochemistry and physiology, where his contributions continue to inform our understanding of cellular respiration and energy production. His work stands as a testament to scientific brilliance and personal resilience in the face of adversity.
Otto Fritz Meyerhof: Nobel Laureate and Pioneer of Muscle Metabolism

Fritz Albert Lipmann (1899 – 1986) - German-American biochemist

Lipmann, whose father was a lawyer, was born on June 12, 1899, in Königsberg, Germany. Königsberg later became part of the USSR and was renamed Kaliningrad. Lipmann's uncle was a pediatrician and had a great influence on Lipmann's decision to become a physician.

After World War I (1914–1918), he enrolled at the University of Munich (Germany) and later at the University of Berlin (Germany), from which he received an MD degree in 1924.

He enrolled in a remarkable three-month course in biochemistry that was taught by Peter Rona, who had worked with Leonor Michaelis. Rona taught three Nobel prizewinners: E.B. (later Sir Ernst) Chain, Hans (later Sir Hans) Krebs and Lipmann.

After completing his Ph.D. in 1929, Lipmann joined Albert Fischer’s laboratory where he worked on using metabolism as a method to measure cell growth.

In 1941 Lipmann moved to Boston to join the research staff of the Massachusetts General Hospital. In the same year, Lipmann proposed the theory of a metabolic dynamo, with adenosine triphosphate as the general link between energy generation and utilization. There, he set out to study acetyl transfer in animals and to confirm that acetyl phosphate represented active acetate.

In 1945, working with a potent enzyme from pigeon liver extract as an assay system for acetyl transfer in animal tissue, Lipmann and colleagues at Massachusetts General Hospital discovered Coenzyme A (CoA), the "A" standing for the activation of acetate. In 1947, he isolated and named the coenzyme, and in 1953, he determined its molecular structure.

Fritz Albert Lipmann received the 1953 Nobel Prize in medicine or physiology “for his discovery of coenzyme A [an important catalytic substance in the cellular conversion of food into energy] and its importance for intermediary metabolism.”
Fritz Albert Lipmann (1899 – 1986) - German-American biochemist

Hans Adolf Krebs

Sir Hans Adolf Krebs was born on Aug. 25, 1900, in Hildesheim, an ancient town of some 50 000 in habitants located near Hanover, in North Germany. He was the son of Dr. Georg Krebs, an ear, nose, and throat surgeon, and his wife Alma Davidson.

Krebs was educated at the Gymnasium Andreanum at Hildesheim and between the years 1918 and 1923 he studied medicine at the Universities of Göttingen, Freiburg-im-Breisgau, and Berlin.

After one year at the Third Medical Clinic of the University of Berlin he took, in 1925, his M.D. degree at the University of Hamburg. Following his medical education, Dr. Krebs spent an additional year studying chemistry in Berlin. In 1926, he was appointed assistant to Professor Otto Warburg at the Kaiser Wilhelm Institute for Biology.

In June 1933, the National Socialist Government terminated his appointment. By that time, in collaboration with his research student Kurt Henseleit, he had published the details of the first cyclic metabolic pathway to be discovered, the urea cycle.

Later he went, at the invitation of Sir Frederick Gowland Hopkins, to the School of Biochemistry, Cambridge, where he held a Rockefeller Studentship until 1934, when he was appointed Demonstrator of Biochemistry in the University of Cambridge.

The following year Dr. Krebs was appointed as lecturer in pharmacology at the University of Sheffield where he quickly moved up the ranks and became lecturer-in-charge of the Department of Biochemistry in 1938. It was there, in collaboration with William Johnson, that he resolved the sequence of reactions that they called the citric acid cycle.

Krebs served on the faculty of the University of Oxford from 1954 to 1967. He wrote (with the British biochemist Hans Kornberg) Energy Transformations in Living Matter (1957), which discusses the complex chemical processes which provide living organisms with high-energy phosphate by way of what is known as the Krebs or citric acid cycle. He also coauthored (with Anne Martin) Reminiscences and Reflections in 1981.

In 1953 he received Nobel Prize (with Fritz Lipmann) the for Physiology or Medicine for the discovery in living organisms of the series of chemical reactions known as the tricarboxylic acid cycle (or the citric acid cycle, or Krebs cycle). Hans Krebs died on November 22, 1981.
Hans Adolf Krebs

Biography of Max Perutz (19 May 1914 – 6 February 2002)

Max Perutz is an Austria-born biochemist who worked in Great Britain for the majority of his career.

Max Ferdinand Perutz was born in Vienna, into a large family of successful industrialists. Both of his parents were members of affluent families of textile manufacturers who had made their fortunes in the 19th century when spinning and weaving became mechanized.

Perutz developed an interest in chemistry due the encouragement of a schoolmaster. This interest compelled him to obtain a degree in chemistry from the University of Vienna where he changed his focus to biochemistry.

In 1936 Max Perutz arrived in Cambridge for PhD from Vienna as a hopeful 22- year graduate student, and he never left.

His excellent research skill earned Perutz a fellowship to continue studying at Cambridge University where he also was offered employment.

In October 1947 Perutz and John Kendrew established the Medical Council Unit for Research on the Molecular Structure of Biological Systems, late rename Molecular Biology Research Unit.

In 1962 Max Perutz received the Nobel Prize in chemistry for his X-ray crystallography determination of the structure of the hemoglobin molecule.

The Queen made him a Companion of Honor in 1975 and awarded him the Order of Merit in 1988.
Biography of Max Perutz (19 May 1914 – 6 February 2002)

Andrew Schally

Andrew Schally
Andrew Schally, the Polish American biochemist who won the Nobel Prize for medicine in 1977 for his discoveries concerning the peptide hormone production of the brain, spent five years (1952 to 1957) in Montreal at McGill University studying endocrinology and carrying out research. Endocrinology is the branch of medicine concerned with endocrine gland s which includes the pituitary, thyroid and adrenal glands as well as the pancreas, ovaries and testicles. He received his PhD from McGill in 1957 and moved that same year to the United States where he has remained ever since, Schally became an American citizen in 1962.

Born in Wilno, Poland, in 1926, Schally survived the years of World War II in the Polish Jewish community in Romania. After the war, he continued his studies in Scotland and at the University of London where he also played some British cub football. He was employed as junior researcher at the national Institute of Medical Research for two years.

He immigrated to Canada in 1952 then became citizen during his five years in Canada. His work began in Montreal and continued in the United States, he investigated hormonal secretions of the pituitary gland and the closely related hypothalamus in the brain, and how the two interrelated. Very little was known about the hypothalamus hormones Schally’s work. He also pioneered the potential application of these hormones in the field of cancer treatment, and he continues to explore the field of hormone-dependent tumors.

He was the recipient of many international awards and honorary degrees including the Charles Mickle Award of the University of Toronto and Gairdner Foundation International Award of Canada.
Andrew Schally