On the occasion of the centennial of the Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine, 1923: Nicolae C. Paulescu —between scientific creativity and political fanatism

ConclusionsA-The Romanian scientist NC Paulescu started an intense research program aimed at the isolation of the antidiabetic hormone before 1916, including an original procedure of pancreatectomy in the dog and the elaboration of a pancreatic extract that achieved excellent results in the treatment of experimental diabetes, demonstrating its beneficial effects on the metabolism of carbohydrates, proteins and fats and reducing both glycosuria and glycemia and the urinary excretion of ketone bodies of depancreatized dogs toward normality. The results of these investigations were published in 1920 and 1921, predating the first report published by FG ​​Banting and CH Best in February 1922. It has been sufficiently demonstrated that Canadian researchers were aware of Paulescu's excellent results, mentioning them only in passing, albeit erroneously misrepresenting key results of the Romanian scientist's publication in the aforementioned semina l Canadian article. Expert historians and international scientists have recognized that the pancreatic extract that Paulescu called pancreina and that obtained by Banting and Best, insulin, were very similar. The October 1923 award of the Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine to FG Banting and JJR M acleod ignored Paulescu's scientific achievements in the treatment of experimental diabetes and rewarded the extraordinary advance of insulin treatment in human diabetes. B-At the end of August 2003, a few days before the date of the celebra...
Source: Acta Diabetologica - Category: Endocrinology Source Type: research