Andrew Schally

Andrzej Viktor "Andrew" Schally (30 November 1926 – 17 October 2024) was a Polish-American endocrinologist who was a co-recipient, with Roger Guillemin and Rosalyn Sussman Yalow, of the 1977 Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine.<ref name="Brit">Andrew V. Schally, "Andrew V. Schally", Encyclopædia Britannica.</ref><ref name="Schally"/><ref name="Victor"/> This award recognized his research in the discovery that the hypothalamus controls hormone production and release by the pituitary gland, which controls the regulation of other hormones in the body.<ref>Template:Cite web</ref> Later in life, Schally utilized his knowledge of hypothalamic hormones to research possible methods for birth control and cancer treatment.

Life and career

Andrzej Wiktor Schally<ref name="Ziolkowska">Aleksandra Ziolkowska-Boehm. Love for Family, Friends, and Books. Rowman & Littlefield, 2015. p. 246. Template:ISBN</ref> was born in Wilno in the Second Polish Republic<ref name="Brit"/><ref name="Schally"/><ref name="Victor"/> (now Vilnius, Lithuania) on 30 November 1926,<ref name="wapo" /> the son of Brigadier General Kazimierz Schally, who was chief of the cabinet of President Ignacy Mościcki of Poland, and Maria (née Łącka). He was born into a Jewish family.<ref>Template:Cite web</ref>

In September 1939, when Poland was attacked by Nazi Germany and the Soviet Union, Schally escaped with Poland's President Ignacy Mościcki, the prime minister and the whole cabinet to the neutral Romania, where they were interned Template:Citation needed.

I was fortunate to survive the holocaust while living among the Jewish-Polish Community in Roumania. I used to speak Polish, Roumanian, Yiddish, Italian and some German and Russian, but I have almost completely forgotten them, and my French in which I used to excel is also now far from fluent.<ref name="Schally">Template:Cite web</ref>

Immediately after the war, in 1945, Schally moved via Italy and France to the United Kingdom<ref name="Schally"/> where he changed his first name to Andrew.<ref name="Ziolkowska"/> Schally received his education in Scotland and England.<ref name="Schally"/> In 1952, he moved to Canada. He received his doctorate in endocrinology from McGill University in 1957.<ref name="Schally"/> That same year he left for a research career in the United States where he has worked principally at Tulane University.<ref name="Schally"/>

Schally conducted research in endocrinology at the Miami Veteran's Administration Medical Center in Miami, Florida.Template:Citation needed A Canadian citizen when he left Canada, Schally became a naturalized citizen of the United States in 1962.<ref name="Schally"/> He was affiliated with the Baylor College of Medicine for some years in Houston, Texas.<ref name="Schally"/>

By 1966 Schally had processed 100,000 Pigs brains to isolate 2.8 mg of thyrotropin-releasing hormone (TRH) <ref name=":0"/> developing a new realm of knowledge concerning the brain's control over the body chemistry. Schally explained in his 1977 Nobel Lecture that he, alongside his researchers, further dissected 250,000 porcine hypothalami in order to isolate 5 mg more of the hormone TRH to determine its molecular structure.<ref name=":0">Template:Cite web</ref> His work also addressed birth control methods and the effects of growth hormones on the body. Together with Roger Guillemin he described the neurohormone gonadotropin-releasing hormone (GnRH) that controls follicle-stimulating hormone (FSH) and luteinizing hormone (LH), two hormones that are integral parts of reproduction and growth and development.

Schally received an honoris causa doctors degree from the Jagiellonian University in Kraków.

Recognized as a Fellow of the Kosciuszko Foundation of Eminent Scientists of Polish Origin and Ancestry.<ref>Template:Cite web</ref>

Schally was married to Margaret Rachel White (divorced), Ana Maria de Medeiros-Comaru (widowed). <ref name="Victor">Template:Cite web</ref> He died at his home in Miami Beach, Florida on 17 October 2024, at the age of 97.<ref name="wapo">Template:Cite news</ref><ref>Template:Cite web</ref>

Cancer research

In 1981, it was demonstrated that the gonadotropin-releasing hormone (GnRH) agonistic analogs that Schally had developed between the years of 1972 and 1978 inhibited the growth of prostate cancer in rats. Alongside Dr. George Tolis, Schally conducted the first clinical trial of GnRH for patients with advanced prostate cancer in 1982. This method is now the preferred treatment for advanced prostate carcinoma. About 70% of patients with prostate cancer receive an agonist as their primary method of treatment.<ref name=":0" /> According to Schally, his treatment causes fewer side effects than radiation and chemotherapy.<ref name=":0" /> The previous method of treatment, orchiectomy or the administration of estrogens, was based on the research of Charles Brenton Huggins.

In 2004, after the death of his wife due to thyroid cancer, Schally found comfort in continuing his research.<ref name=":0" />

Awards and honors

• Van Meter Award of the American Thyroid Association (1969)<ref>Template:Cite web</ref>
• Albert Lasker Award (1975)
• Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine (1977)
• Golden Plate Award of the American Academy of Achievement (1978)<ref>Template:Cite web</ref>

See also

• List of Poles, Biology, medicine
• List of Nobel laureates in Physiology or Medicine, laureates
• Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine

Sources

• Aleksandra Ziółkowska, Korzenie są polskie (The Roots Are Polish), Warsaw, 1992, Template:ISBN.
• Aleksandra Ziolkowska-Boehm, The Roots Are Polish, Toronto, 2004, Template:ISBN.
• Nicholas Wade, The Nobel Duel, Garden City, Anchor Press/Doubleday, 1981.

External links

• Template:Nobelprize