Jakub Parnas
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Jakub Karol Parnas, also known as Yakov Oskarovich Parnas (russian: Яков Оскарович Парнас) (January 16, 1884 – January 29, 1949) was a prominent
Polish Polish may refer to: * Anything from or related to Poland, a country in Europe * Polish language * Poles, people from Poland or of Polish descent * Polish chicken *Polish brothers (Mark Polish and Michael Polish, born 1970), American twin screenwr ...
Soviet
biochemist Biochemists are scientists who are trained in biochemistry. They study chemical processes and chemical transformations in living organisms. Biochemists study DNA, proteins and Cell (biology), cell parts. The word "biochemist" is a portmanteau of ...
who contributed to the discovery of the Embden–Meyerhof–Parnas pathway, together with Otto Fritz Meyerhof and
Gustav Georg Embden Gustav Georg Embden (10 November 1874 – 25 July 1933) was a German physiological chemist. Background Gustav Embden was a son of the Hamburg lawyer and politician George Heinrich Embden. His grandmother Charlotte Heine was a well-known salonn ...
. He became a Soviet activist after the annexation of Western Ukraine in 1939. He was arrested during the Jewish Anti-Fascist Committee affair in 1949 and died in the prison, reportedly of heart attack.


Biography

Parnas was born in 1884 in
Tarnopol Ternópil ( uk, Тернопіль, Ternopil' ; pl, Tarnopol; yi, טאַרנאָפּל, Tarnopl, or ; he, טארנופול (טַרְנוֹפּוֹל), Tarnopol; german: Tarnopol) is a city in the west of Ukraine. Administratively, Ternopi ...
, at that time part of the
Austro-Hungarian Empire Austria-Hungary, often referred to as the Austro-Hungarian Empire,, the Dual Monarchy, or Austria, was a constitutional monarchy and great power in Central Europe between 1867 and 1918. It was formed with the Austro-Hungarian Compromise of ...
, in the province of
Galicia Galicia may refer to: Geographic regions * Galicia (Spain), a region and autonomous community of northwestern Spain ** Gallaecia, a Roman province ** The post-Roman Kingdom of the Suebi, also called the Kingdom of Gallaecia ** The medieval King ...
(now split between Poland and Ukraine), to Jewish parents. He graduated from the Royal Technical College of Charlottenburg in 1904. From 1920 to 1941, he was head of the Institute of the Medical Chemistry at Lviv University. He traveled across Europe, collaborating with universities in Cambridge, Naples,
Strasbourg Strasbourg (, , ; german: Straßburg ; gsw, label=Bas Rhin Alsatian, Strossburi , gsw, label=Haut Rhin Alsatian, Strossburig ) is the prefecture and largest city of the Grand Est region of eastern France and the official seat of the Eu ...
, Ghent and Zurich. He was a member of the German Academy of Sciences Leopoldina, Corresponding Member of the Polish Academy of Sciences, as well an honorary doctor of Sorbonne University and the University of Athens. After the Soviet invasion of Poland and annexation of
Western Ukraine Western Ukraine or West Ukraine ( uk, Західна Україна, Zakhidna Ukraina or , ) is the territory of Ukraine linked to the former Kingdom of Galicia–Volhynia, which was part of the Polish–Lithuanian Commonwealth, the Austria ...
in 1939 by the Soviet Union, Parnas remained in Lviv to continue his work in the institute. He also started collaborating with the Soviet authorities by taking on a political role in the communist District Soviet Worker's Delegation. In 1941, after the German invasion of the Soviet Union, Parnas was evacuated deeper into the USSR and remained there for the rest of his life. Only a few days after his departure, Lviv (Lwów) was occupied by the Nazi Germany army, who
massacred A massacre is the killing of a large number of people or animals, especially those who are not involved in any fighting or have no way of defending themselves. A massacre is generally considered to be morally unacceptable, especially when per ...
approximately 45 Lwów professors. Parnas was a member of the Union of Polish Patriots. In the Soviet Union, Parnas met Joseph Stalin, and received his own laboratory. He became an Academician of the Academy of Sciences of the USSR and a founding member of the Academy of Medical Sciences of the USSR. Despite his achievements and popularity, Parnas was falsely accused of being a spy of the West and arrested by the KGB on January 28, 1949. According to KGB's archives, he died during his first interrogation at Lubyanka prison "from a heart attack" on January 29, 1949.


Achievements

Parnas's major work was the study of the mechanisms of carbohydrate metabolism in
muscle Skeletal muscles (commonly referred to as muscles) are organs of the vertebrate muscular system and typically are attached by tendons to bones of a skeleton. The muscle cells of skeletal muscles are much longer than in the other types of muscl ...
tissue. Together with Władysław Baranowski, he discovered the process of
phosphorolysis Phosphorolysis is the cleavage of a compound in which inorganic phosphate is the attacking group. It is analogous to hydrolysis.Stryer, L. (1988) Biochemistry, 3rd ed., Freeman (p. 451) An example of this is glycogen breakdown by glycogen phospho ...
.http://nobelprize.org/nobel_prizes/medicine/laureates/1947/cori-lecture.pdf. Parnas also made a major contribution to the theoretical analysis of
glycolysis Glycolysis is the metabolic pathway that converts glucose () into pyruvate (). The free energy released in this process is used to form the high-energy molecules adenosine triphosphate (ATP) and reduced nicotinamide adenine dinucleotide (NADH ...
.


Legacy

Parnas is honored by the Polish–Ukrainian Parnas Conference organized by the Polish and Ukrainian Biochemical Societies, which has been held every two years since 1996.Postepy Biochemii Vol. 43 No. 5 1997 p.311 In 2009, Prof. Andrzej Dżugaj, the President of the Polish Biochemical Society, suggested to include Israeli biochemists to the Conference organizers to acknowledge the roots of J.K. Parnas and his co-workers. Thanks to his efforts, the VIII Parnas Conference took place in 2011, in Poland, for the first time, with the joint organization by three national Societies, Polish, Ukrainian and Israel. In 2013 the conference took place in Jerusalem (organized by Israeli Society for Biochemistry and Molecular Biology). The next Parnas conference took place in Poland at 10–12 July 2016, (Wrocław University).


References


Further reading

*Tomasz Cieszyński
O PROFESORZE JAKUBIE PARNASIE NA TLE LWOWA z lat 1938 do 1945
(see bottom of the article for English summary) *Tadeusz Korzybski, ''Słownik biologów polskich'', Warszawa 1987


External links


Barańska J ''et al''. (2007) Jakub Karol Parnas – life and creativity (Opening Lecture), 6th Parnas Conference Molecular Mechanism of Cellular Signalling (Kraków, Poland, 30 May – 2 June 2007) ''Acta Biochimica Polonica'' 54 (Suppl. 2), 1
{{DEFAULTSORT:Parnas, Jakob Karol 1884 births 1949 deaths People from Lviv Oblast Ukrainian Jews Ukrainian biochemists Jewish scientists Jews from Galicia (Eastern Europe) Polish people who died in Soviet detention Soviet biochemists