Obituary — Professor Hisayuki Matsuo

[摘要] Dr. Hisayuki Matsuo, an honorary member of The Japan Endocrine Society, quietly drew his life to a close on June 8 th, 2022 at the advanced age of 93. After graduating from The University of Tokyo in 1954, he started his research at the graduate school of that university. Although he is best known as one of the greatest leaders in endocrinology, his initial research field in those days was the organic chemistry of natural products. During his early research days, he established a unique and highly sensitive method for C-terminal amino-acid determination of peptides by tritium labeling. Thereafter, in 1970, Dr. Matsuo was requested by Dr. Andrew Schally of Tulane University to help determine the structure of the hypothalamic peptide by taking advantage of his method. In 1971 Dr. Matsuo succeeded in the virtually impossible task with a trace amount of purified peptide in a short period. Dr. Schally would go on to win the Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine in 1977 for the identification of LH-RH. Dr. Matsuo’s essential contribution to the highly competitive race to identify LH-RH has become widely known by the account in The Nobel Duel [1] written by Nicholas Wade in 1981.

[学科分类] 内分泌与代谢学