Nicolas C. Paulescu

Nicolas C. Paulescu (born 1869, Bucharest, Romania—died 1931, Bucharest) was a Romanian physiologist who conducted groundbreaking research on the antidiabetic hormone insulin. However, his anti-Semitic writings contributed to the rise of the fascist Iron Guard movement (1930–41).

As a young student, Paulescu developed an interest in the arts and in the natural, physical, and chemical sciences. In 1888 he went to Paris to study medicine, and three years later he took a post as a nonresident medical student at the Hôtel-Dieu de Paris. There he worked with French physician Étienne Lancereaux, who was the first to suggest that diabetes mellitus originated in the pancreas, and with French scientist Albert Dastre, who had studied with Claude Bernard, the renowned physiologist who discovered the role of the pancreas in digestion.

In 1901, after having received a degree in medicine (1897) and doctorates in physiology (1898) and the natural sciences (1899) from the University of Paris, Paulescu returned to Romania, where he joined the faculty of medicine at the University of Bucharest. There he undertook studies in experimental physiology and in 1903 published with Lancereaux Traité de Médecine, Nosologie (“Treaty of Medicine, Nosology”), the first of a four-volume series on disease and physiology (the other three volumes were published in 1906, 1912, and 1930). Several years later, Paulescu published a paper in which he described a new procedure for the surgical removal of the pituitary gland that favoured improved patient survival. Paulescu’s research inspired subsequent work by American neurosurgeon Harvey Cushing, who later gained international acclaim for his research on the pituitary.

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Between 1914 and 1916, Paulescu worked to identify the active pancreatic substance that the earlier research of German physiologist and pathologist Oskar Minkowski and German physician Joseph von Mering had suggested could be used to treat diabetes. By 1916, Paulescu reportedly had isolated the substance, which he called “pancrein” (or “pancreine”; now considered to have been insulin). (Paulescu reported the discovery himself in a 1921 paper.) After injecting the extract into the jugular veins of diabetic dogs, he found that the dogs’ abnormally high blood glucose levels were temporarily returned to normal. Shortly after completing the experiments, he was called to service in the Romanian army.

Following World War I, Paulescu wrote several papers describing his experiments and conclusions. Four of the papers were published in late July 1921, and the last, the most comprehensive report, was published at the end of August that year. That same summer, Canadian physician Frederick Banting and medical student Charles H. Best, who had discovered an active substance in pancreatic extracts, injected the substance into a diabetic dog and found that it effectively lowered the dog’s blood glucose levels. While Paulescu struggled and ultimately failed to purify pancrein (he obtained only a partially purified extract), Banting and Best, working with Canadian chemist James B. Collip and Scottish physiologist J.J.R. Macleod, successfully purified their extract. In January 1922, the Canadian team formally tested the purified substance in a human subject and immediately thereafter published their findings. It is unclear whether Paulescu knew of the Canadian researchers’ work, or vice versa. Paulescu applied for a patent on pancrein and its method of manufacture, and it was awarded (April 10, 1922) by the Minister of Industry and Trade of Romania. The following year, however, he learned that the Nobel Prize for Physiology or Medicine had been awarded to Banting and Macleod for their discoveries.

Paulescu’s anti-Semitic writings, which encouraged the public to act violently against Jews, were revered by supporters of far-right political groups. He helped found the National Christian Union in 1922, which in 1923 became the National Christian Defense League (LANC). The LANC was an influential anti-Semitic party that fueled the rise of the Iron Guard.

In 2002 the Paulescu Institute (a diabetes research institute) was inaugurated, and a statue of Paulescu was unveiled at the University of Bucharest. In 2003 a ceremony scheduled for the unveiling of a bust of Paulescu in Paris that had been organized by the French minister of health and the Romanian ambassador in Paris was protested by the Simon Wiesenthal Center, an international Jewish human rights organization. Although Romanian authorities opposed the complaint, the ceremony was canceled.

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