History of muscle research at University of Szeged
The Department of Biochemistry has a long tradition of skeletal muscle research. The research work of Nobel Prize winner Albert Szent-Gyorgyi and his colleagues, namely the discovery of actin in relation to muscle contraction and their discoveries in the process of biological oxidation are associated with the Department.
Albert Szent-Gyorgyi was appointed head of the Institute of Medical Chemistry at University of Szeged in 1928. After he returned from Cambridge, he became the chair in 1930 and headed the Institute until 1945. Szent-Gyorgyi continued the research he had started in Cambridge. In Cambridge, he has successfully described the oxidation chain reaction of four-carbon dicarboxylic acids, the increase in oxygen consumption/carbon dioxide production upon addition of fumaric acid, and the reductive compound, hexuronic acid, observed in plant crops and tsuprarenal gland.In Szeged, the most significant result of this period was the discovery and identification of hexuronic acid (actually vitamin C) in paprika, a typical agricultural product of the Szeged region. This discovery was awarded with the Nobel Prize in Medicine and Life Sciences in 1937. To this day, this is the only Nobel Prize for which the recipient returned home to Hungary.
After the characterization of vitamin C, the research group had basic discoveris on the field of muscle biochemistry. In the 1940s, the Institute published the basic papers of classical muscle biochemistry, the characterisation of myosin, actin, actomyosin and their interactions. Due to the wartime these papers were published in the in-house publication of Albert Szent-Gyorgyi, Ilona Banga, F. Bruno Straub, Wilfred Mommaerts, Ferenc Guba, from 1942-45.
In 1952, the name of the Institute of Medical Chemistry was changed to the Institute of Medical Chemistry and Biochemistry, and in 1962 the biochemistry department became independent as the Department of Biochemistry. Currently, the Keller-Pinter Lab is carrying on the tradition of skeletal muscle research at the University of Szeged. The fundamental aim of the research of Keller-Pinter Lab is to continue the tradition of skeletal muscle research started by Albert Szent-Gyorgyi and to preserve this heritage and values at the University of Szeged.