Bernardo alberto houssay biography

On March 29, 1962, President John F. Kennedy met with several leading scientists from around the Americas. One of them was the 74-year-old Argentine physiologist Bernardo Houssay (Figure 1). Nobody discussed it during the meeting, but the of the older man had been vital to the health of the US leader. Fifteen years earlier, JFK had been diagnosed with a condition called adrenal insufficiency, in which the adrenal glands do not produce enough adrenal . That same year the Argentine Houssay had received the in Physiology and Medicine for making discoveries important to the understanding of those very .

To diagnose the young JFK, physicians in 1947 had relied on what was called the "ACTH stimulation test," whereby adrenocorticotropic (ACTH) is administered to the patient to see how well it stimulates the adrenal glands to release the important hormone . Although JFK’s test results showed problems with adrenal gland function, by the late 1950s his results on the same test had normalized. This led doctors to suspect that JFK – Senator Kennedy at the time – did not have Addison disease, a permanent insufficiency of the adrenal glands. Instead, they had attributed the inability of his adrenal glands to respond to ACTH to extreme stress and a bout of malaria that JFK suffered during World War II.

Unresponsive adrenal glands, whether permanent or temporary, could be recognized with certainty only after researchers had learned of ACTH. Especially its by a gland at the base of the brain called the pituitary and how multiple enable the pituitary and other glands to affect one another in what are called "hormone feedback loops." That understanding rested on the very for which Dr. Bernardo Houssay (Figure 2) had been awarded his .

A new area of research

In 1887 the science of endocrinology did not yet exist, but physicians had come a long way since ancient times when Galen of Pergamon had first described the pituitary, a struc

Argentine physician (1887–1971)

Bernardo Alberto Houssay (April 10, 1887 – September 21, 1971) was an Argentinephysiologist. Houssay was a co-recipient of the 1947 Nobel Prize for Physiology or Medicine for discovering the role played by pituitaryhormones in regulating the amount of glucose in animals, sharing the prize with Carl Ferdinand Cori and Gerty Cori. He is the first Latin American Nobel laureate in the sciences.

Biography

Early life

Bernardo Alberto Houssay was born April 10, 1887, in Buenos Aires. His parents Albert and Clara Houssay were immigrants from France. A precocious youngster, he was admitted to the Pharmacy School at the University of Buenos Aires at 14 years of age and subsequently to the Faculty of Medicine of the same university at 17 years old and was there from 1904 to 1910. While a third-year medical student, Houssay took up a post as a research and teaching assistant in the Chair of Physiology.

Career

After graduating, he quickly developed and presented his M.D. thesis on the physiological activities of pituitary extracts, published in 1911. This was a theme he would pursue for the rest of his scientific career. Since 1908 he was an assistant lecturer in the same department and immediately after his doctorate, he took up the post of Professor of Physiology in the university's School of Veterinary Medicine. Simultaneously, he started a private practice as an assistant physician at the municipal hospital of Buenos Aires. In 1913, he became Chief Physician at the Alvear Hospital, and in 1915, became Chief of the Section of Experimental Pathology at the National Public Health Laboratories in Buenos Aires.

In 1919, Houssay was appointed as the chair of physiology at the University of Buenos Aires Medicine School, serving there until 1943. He transformed and directed the department into a highly respected research department in experimental physiology an

The pituitary gland influences a myriad of physiologic functions with extraordinary elegance. Shortly after the discovery of insulin, Argentinian science prodigy Bernardo Houssay elucidated the important role of the anterior pituitary, also called the adenohypophysis, in carbohydrate metabolism. This discovery helped to unravel the intricacies of glucose homeostasis and the fascinating feedback servo mechanisms that undergird the entire endocrine system.

TEENAGE SAVANT

Bernardo Alberto Houssay was born to Dr Albert and Clara Houssay, both of whom had emigrated from France to Argentina. His father worked as a barrister and his mother was a housewife. From an early age, young Houssay exhibited a formidable aptitude for academics. His intellectual abilities allowed him to accelerate his education, attaining his baccalaureate degree with honours via a scholarship from a well-respected private institution at the tender age of 13. Less than a year later, in 1901, he matriculated at the University of Buenos Aires to pursue an advanced degree in pharmacology. By 1904, he had graduated as valedictorian from this programme and had decided to advance his education to become a physician. Upon his graduation in 1910, at the age of 23, he was made Professor of Physiology at the university’s School of Veterinary Medicine.

While completing clinical work in 1908, Houssay participated in the care of a patient who was suffering from symptoms of acromegaly. The patient was known to have a pituitary tumour and Houssay’s interest in the hypophysis was piqued. By this time, he was already an avid reader of the work of French physiologist Claude Bernard. Inspired to look into the physiologic activity of pituitary extracts, the young medical student taught himself the necessary skills to harvest the tissue, analyse it and isolate the physiologically active components. The work was described in his doctorate thesis, for which he was awarded the University of Buenos Aires’ prestigiou

Bernardo Alberto Houssay was one of the most prominent and influential Latin American Scientists of the twentieth century. His total dedication to the pursuit of knowledge and his untiring efforts to foster scientific and technical training among his compatriots received worldwide recognition. For more than twenty-five years his Institute of Physiology at the University of Buenos
Aires was the scientific beacon for all of Latin America, and from its laboratories emerged disciples who were to occupy prominent positions in scientific research and training throughout the continent.

Bernardo Alberto Houssay was one of the eight children of Dr. Albert and Clara (née Laffont) Houssay, who had come to Argentina from France. His father was a barrister. Bernardo Alberto was a precocious child who by the age of thirteen had already received his baccalaureate degree with honours from the Colegio Británico, a private school. Thus in 1901, aged 14, he was able to enter the School of Pharmacy at the University of Buenos Aires, from which he graduated first in his class in 1904, seventeen years of age. Houssay subsequently studied medicine at the University of Buenos Aires between 1904 and 1910. In 1907, before completing his studies, he took up a post in the Department of Physiology. He began here his research on the physiological activities of pituitary extracts, resulting in a M.D.-thesis published in 1911 which earned him a University prize. To pay for his education and personal expenses, Houssay was working as a hospital pharmacist, working in the hospital Alvear.

In 1908 he was named an assistant in the department of physiology of the Medical School, and 1910 he was appointed Professor of Physiology in the University's School of Veterinary Medicine.

A measure of Houssay’s versatility and capacity for work can be seen in his activities after graduating from medical school. He established a private practice and became chief of a municipal hos