"VITAMIN C IN MEDICINE"

ADDENBROOKE'S HOSPITAL CAMBRIDGE
FRIDAY 23 NOVEMBER 2007 3.00 pm
ALICE FISHER LECTURE HALL
"VITAMIN C IN MEDICINE"
Lecture by Prof. Kay-Tee Khaw
Free entrance

ALBERT SZENT-GYORGYI
Born in 1893 in Budapest, deceased in 1986 in Woods Hall, (Massachusetts) As a student of medicine he was interested in morphology, later doing biopsies in the instutute run by his uncle, Mihaly Lenhoss. As a medical student he fought in the war, but soon got wounded and was demobilised. After graduating in medicine he both improved his knowledge and kept courses in Bratislava, Prague, Berlin, Leiden and Cambridge. He acquired a PhD in Chemistry in Cambridge in 1927. From 1931 - 1945, he was the Professor of the Fernc Joszef University of Szeged, Medical Chemistry institute. From 1945 - 1947 he was a Professor of Biochemistry at the Budapest Medical University. From 1946 - 1948 he was the vice-president of the Hungarian Scientific Academy. In 1947 he emigrated to the USA. From 1947 - 1962 he was the director of the USA Scientific Institute for Research of the Muscular System, Marine Biology Laboratory.

He discovered the catalysis of dicarbon acid C4, a basis for Krebs circulation process. His research concerning the peroxide-system led to the discovery of the reducing agent necessary for oxydation - the ascorbic acid. He established the compounds of hexuronic acid, identified it with the ascorbic acid - and this is vitamin C.

The discovery brought him the Nobel prize in 1937. After doing some submolecular research his interest turned towards malignant tumours.

He attempted to solve the problem of cellular regulation for two decades. The Medical University of Szeged, after offering him the title of Doctor Honoris Causa , adopted his name in 1987.

ADDENBROOKE'S
In 1719 Dr. John Addenbrooke, a fellow and former bursar of St Catherine's College, left £. 4,500 in his will for a hospital. One of the first provincial voluntary hospitals in Britain, Addenbrooke's opened its doors in 1766 in Trumpington Street in Cambridge with just 20 beds and 11 patients.

During the 18th and 19th centuries it grew very rapidly. By 1950 the hospital was having difficulty accommodating the expansion generated by the introduction of the NHS. In 1960s it began a staged move to its present 66 acre campus in Hills Road. The first stage was opened by the Queen in 1962, and it has continued to grow ever since.

CAMBRIDGE BIOMEDICAL CAMPUS
The Cambridge Research Institute is located in the same campus as Addenbrooke's Hospital, the Cambridge University Teaching Hospital which includes the Regional Cancer Centre. Cambridge scientists have been frequently honoured for their breakthrough discoveries. Cambridge has produced over 25 Nobel Prize winners- 22 alone in Medicine. In the last five years it has become a leading centre for cancer research.

The Addenbrooke's site is home to a 1,100 bed hopsital as well as a number of internationally- known University laboratories and reaserch institutes. The laboratory and clinical research institutes include the world- famous MRC Laboratory for Molecular Biology, the Hutchinson/MRC Research Centre, the Strangeways Research Laboratories for Genetic Epidemiology and the Cambridge Institute for Medical Research.

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