Dr Maud Menten (March 20, 1879 – July 17, 1960) Was a Canadian Physician-Scientist Who Made Significant Contributions to Enzyme Kinetics and Histochemistry

Total Page:16

File Type:pdf, Size:1020Kb

Dr Maud Menten (March 20, 1879 – July 17, 1960) Was a Canadian Physician-Scientist Who Made Significant Contributions to Enzyme Kinetics and Histochemistry Dr Maud Menten (March 20, 1879 – July 17, 1960) was a Canadian physician-scientist who made significant contributions to enzyme kinetics and histochemistry. Her name is associated with the famous Michaelis–Menten equation in biochemistry. Maud Menten was born in Port Lambton, Ontario and studied medicine at the University of Toronto (B.A. 1904, M.B. 1907, M.D. 1911, Ph.D., 1916). She was among the first women in Canada to earn a medical doctorate. She completed her thesis work at University of Chicago. At that time women were not allowed to do research in Canada, so she decided to do research in other countries such as the United States and Germany. In 1912 she moved to Berlin where she worked with Leonor Michaelis and co-authored their paper in Biochemische Zeitschrift which showed that the rate of an enzyme-catalyzed reaction is proportional to the amount of the enzyme-substrate complex. This relationship between reaction rate and enzyme– substrate concentration is known as the Michaelis–Menten equation. After studying with Michaelis in Germany she entered graduate school at the University of Chicago where she obtained her PhD in 1916. Her dissertation was titled "The Alkalinity of the Blood in Malignancy and Other Pathological Conditions; Together with Observations on the Relation of the Alkalinity of the Blood to Barometric Pressure". Menten worked at the University of Pittsburgh (1923–1950), becoming Assistant Professor and then Associate Professor in the School of Medicine and head of pathology at the Children's Hospital of Pittsburgh. Her final promotion to full Professor, in 1948, was at the age of 69 in the last years of her career. Her final academic post was as a research fellow at the British Columbia Medical Research Institute (1951–1953). .
Recommended publications
  • Single Molecule Enzymology À La Michaelis-Menten
    Single molecule enzymology à la Michaelis-Menten Ramon Grima1, Nils G. Walter2 and Santiago Schnell3* 1 School of Biological Sciences and SynthSys, University of Edinburgh, Edinburgh, UK 2 Department of Chemistry, University of Michigan, Ann Arbor, Michigan, USA 3 Department of Molecular & Integrative Physiology, Department of Computational Medicine & Bioinformatics, and Brehm Center for Diabetes Research, University of Michigan Medical School, Ann Arbor, Michigan, USA * To whom the correspondence should be addressed. E-mail: [email protected] Review article accepted for publication to FEBS Journal special issue on Enzyme Kinetics and Allosteric Regulation 1 Abstract In the past one hundred years, deterministic rate equations have been successfully used to infer enzyme-catalysed reaction mechanisms and to estimate rate constants from reaction kinetics experiments conducted in vitro. In recent years, sophisticated experimental techniques have been developed that allow the measurement of enzyme- catalysed and other biopolymer-mediated reactions inside single cells at the single molecule level. Time course data obtained by these methods are considerably noisy because molecule numbers within cells are typically quite small. As a consequence, the interpretation and analysis of single cell data requires stochastic methods, rather than deterministic rate equations. Here we concisely review both experimental and theoretical techniques which enable single molecule analysis with particular emphasis on the major developments in the field of theoretical stochastic enzyme kinetics, from its inception in the mid-twentieth century to its modern day status. We discuss the differences between stochastic and deterministic rate equation models, how these depend on enzyme molecule numbers and substrate inflow into the reaction compartment and how estimation of rate constants from single cell data is possible using recently developed stochastic approaches.
    [Show full text]
  • Health Matters Fall 2017
    THE OTTAWA VALLEY’S HEALTH MAGAZINE HealthMattersFREE! FALL 2017 Eating With A Happy Heart: Advice from the authors of Looneyspooons Local Canadian Experts Health Feature Facts Section: FOOD! Kids Lunch Church Suppers Hacks Around The County! Saving Silas: Meet a little boy who was The Food born with the will to live Crossword In honour of Canada’s 150th, we Canada 150 are trying to attract 150 aircraft to fly-in to the airport on one day! FLY-IN Come Join Us! Thi s goi is g n to be a very o c ay. ol d September 23rd | 10am-3pm This is a FREE event to attend. Pembroke & Area Lunch is available for purchase. AIRPORTT Plus: Ry-J’s, Aircraft Simulator, 49 Years in Aviation. and Canadian Forces aircraft on display! Easy parking in the Expo 150 field across from the airfield. Seating available at the airfield. Meet local and visiting pilots who are flying-in on this special day. 176 Len Hopkins Drive, Petawawa. Visit www.flycyta.ca/Canada150 or www.facebook.com/flycyta. Pembroke & Area AIRPORTT 49 Years in Aviation. FROM THE PUBLISHER FALL 2017 A Letter From Audrey Reader’s handwritten letter says it best about the Health Matters vision as we complete our fifth year After our last issue, I received a handwritten Ottawa Valley, even lifetime residents are letter in the mail from a woman named Audrey. unaware of! You do an excellent job of It was so compelling that I realized I could not bringing them to light, so more residents can do a better job than she did for the Publisher’s use them to make their lives better.
    [Show full text]
  • Covalent Modification of Reduced Flavin Mononucleotide in Type-2 Isopentenyl Diphosphate Isomerase by Active-Site-Directed Inhibitors
    Covalent modification of reduced flavin mononucleotide in type-2 isopentenyl diphosphate isomerase by active-site-directed inhibitors Takuya Nagaia,1, Hideaki Unnob,1, Matthew Walter Janczakc,1, Tohru Yoshimuraa, C. Dale Poulterc,2, and Hisashi Hemmia,2 aDepartment of Applied Molecular Bioscience, Graduate School of Bioagricultural Sciences, Nagoya University, Furo-cho, Chikusa-ku, Nagoya, Aichi 464-8601, Japan; bDivision of Chemistry and Materials Science, Graduate School of Engineering, Nagasaki University, Bunkyo-machi, Nagasaki, Nagasaki 852-8521, Japan; and cDepartment of Chemistry, University of Utah, 315 South 1400 East RM2020, Salt Lake City, UT 84112 Contributed by C. Dale Poulter, October 11, 2011 (sent for review July 9, 2011) Evidence for an unusual catalysis of protonation/deprotonation by not detect signals for putative radical intermediates (9). Attempts a reduced flavin mononucleotide cofactor is presented for type-2 to inhibit the enzyme by incubation with a cyclopropyl analogue isopentenyl diphosphate isomerase (IDI-2), which catalyzes isomer- of IPP, designed to rearrange to a homoallylic structure by a ization of the two fundamental building blocks of isoprenoid bio- radical clock mechanism, were unsuccessful (12, 13). Instead, the synthesis, isopentenyl diphosphate and dimethylallyl diphosphate. analogue was an alternate substrate that isomerized to the cor- The covalent adducts formed between irreversible mechanism- responding DMAPP derivative without a cyclopropylcarbinyl- based inhibitors, 3-methylene-4-penten-1-yl diphosphate or 3-oxi- homoallyl radical rearrangement. ranyl-3-buten-1-yl diphosphate, and the flavin cofactor were inves- Mechanism-based inhibitors of IDI-1, which are activated by tigated by X-ray crystallography and UV-visible spectroscopy. Both protonation of epoxide and diene moieties in these compounds, the crystal structures of IDI-2 binding the flavin-inhibitor adduct – and the UV-visible spectra of the adducts indicate that the covalent also inactivate IDI-2 (12 15).
    [Show full text]
  • Maud Menten, a Physician and Biochemist
    Maud Menten Canadian medical researcher Maud Menten (1879-1960) has been called the "grandmother of biochemistry," a "radical feminist 1920s flapper," and a "petite dynamo." Not only was she an author of Michaelis-Menten equation for enzyme kinetics (like the plot in indigo in my portrait), she invented the azo-dye coupling for alkaline phosphatase, the first example of enzyme histochemistry, still used in histochemistry imaging of tissues today (which inspired the histology background of the portrait), and she also performed the first electrophoretic separation of blood haemoglobin in 1944! Born in Port Lambton, Ontario, she studied at the University of Toronto, earning her bachelor's in 1904, and then graduated from medical school (M.B., bachelor's of medicine) in 1907. She published her first paper with Archibald Macallum, the Professor of Physiology at U of T (who went on to set up the National Research Council of Canada), on the distribution of chloride ions in nerve cells in 1906. She worked a year at the Rockefeller Institute in New York, where along with Simon Flexner, first director of the Institute, she co-authored a book on radium bromide and cancer, the first publication produced by the Institute - barely 10 years after Marie Curie had discovered radium. She completed the first of two fellowships at Western Reserve University (now Case Western Reserve University), then she earned a doctorate in medical research in 1911 at U of T. She was one of the first Canadian women to earn such an advanced medical degree. She then moved to Berlin (travelling by boat, unfazed by the recent sinking of the Titanic) to work with Leonor Michaelis.
    [Show full text]
  • Leonor Michaelis and Maud Leonora Menten Celebrating 100 Years of the Michaelis–Menten Equation
    ARTICLE-IN-A-BOX Leonor Michaelis and Maud Leonora Menten Celebrating 100 years of the Michaelis–Menten Equation Leonor Michaelis was an honoured German biochemist and Maud Leonora Menten an honoured Canadian pathologist, during the nineteenth century. Though Michaelis sustained his interest in enzymology and biochemistry, Menten moved to pathology and became a renowned pathologist later in her career. The research collaboration of Michaelis and Menten was phenomenal resulting in the celebrated ‘Michaelis–Menten Equation’. Michaelis and Menten’s classic paper titled ‘Die Kinetik der Invertin wirkung’, published in Biochemische Zeitschrift in 1913 marks its centenary this year. This seminal paper which proved vital for the teaching of enzyme kinetics, was acknowledged with so much appreciation and attention that no textbook in biology for undergraduate and graduate students across the world is complete without a discussion of the Michaelis–Menten Equation. An earlier paper by Victor Henri and Brown lacked one important insight which was reported by Michaelis and Menten: that insight was the analysis of reaction in terms of the initial rate. Michaelis and Menten introduced the concept of measuring the initial activity of the enzyme by mixing it with substrate so that product accumulation would not inhibit the activity. Leonor Michaelis (1875–1949) Leonor Michaelis was born in Berlin, Germany on January 16, 1875. He graduated from the ‘humanistic’ Koellnisches Gymnasium in 1893. This gymnasium was special as unlike the other humanistic gymnasiums, it also included chemistry and physics labs which were not in general use and it was only the keen initiative of two professors that enabled interested students learn the subjects.
    [Show full text]
  • Maud Leonora Menten
    Regulars Past Times A woman at the dawn of biochemistry Maud Leonora Menten Athel Cornish-Bowden Ask an average biochemist who was the first to realize that variant proteins could be detected by (Bioénergétique et Ingénierie electrophoresis and sedimentation, and had used this understanding to recognize different forms of des Protéines, CNRS and haemoglobin, the reply would probably refer to Linus Pauling and his work on sickle cell disease. Yet, Aix-Marseille Université, although this work was certainly important, that would be the wrong answer, because Maud Leonora France) and John Lagnado Menten, who sometimes seems to be remembered for one paper only, had this idea several years (Honorary Archivist, the before him, and used it to recognize the differences between foetal and adult haemoglobin1. She was Biochemical Society) unfortunate, however, in that her paper appeared in war time, and was eclipsed a few years later by a far more high-profile study2. In 2013 we celebrate two important centenaries not only of Director, and later the person who appointed Leonor the admission of women to the Biochemical Society (why Michaelis to his position there. With Flexner and James W. did it take so long?), but also of the publication of a paper Jobling, she wrote a book (the first monograph emanating by Maud Menten, who was one of the first women to leave from the Rockefeller Institute) on the effects of radium her mark in biochemistry, with a paper that is cited more bromide on tumours of animals, published in 1910 – often in the 21st Century than it was in the 20th.
    [Show full text]
  • The Biological Laboratory
    LONG ISLAND BIOLOGICAL ASSOCIATION ANNUAL REPORT OF THE BIOLOGICAL LABORATORY COLD SPRING HARBOR LONG ISLAND, NEW YORK 1939 LONG ISLAND BIOLOGICAL ASSOCIATION INCORPORATED 1924 ANNUAL REPORT OF THE BIOLOGICAL LABORATORY FOUNDED 1890 FIFTIETH YEAR 1939 SCIENTIFIC ADVISORY COMMITTEE J. H. Bodine, Chairman,State University of Iowa Harold A. Abramson,College of Physicians and Surgeons, Columbia University Edgar Allen, Yale University,School of Medicine Stanley A. Cain, Universityof Tennessee Robert Chambers, WashingtonSquare College, New York University Harry A. Charipper,Washington Square College, New York University Kenneth S. Cole, College of Physiciansand Surgeons, Columbia University William H. Cole, Rutgers University Henry S. Conard, GrinnellCollege George W. Corner, Universityof Rochester, School of Medicine and Dentistry W. J. Crozier, Harvard University Charles B. Davenport, Carnegie Institution of Washington Alden B. Dawson, Harvard University S. R. Detwiler, College of Physicians and Surgeons,Columbia University Hugo Fricke, The Biological Laboratory Robert Gaunt, Washington Square College, New York University A. J. Grout, Newfane, Vt. Ross G. Harrison, Yale University Hans 0. Haterius, Wayne University, College of Medicine S.I. Kornhauser, University of Louisville Medical School Duncan A. Maclnnes, The Rockefeller Institute for Medical Research fHarold Mestre, Bard College Stuart Mudd, University of Pennsylvania, School of Medicine Hans Mueller, Massachusetts Institute of Technology J.S. Nicholas, Yale University W. J. V. Osterhout, The Rockefeller Institute for Medical Research Eric Ponder, The Biological Laboratory Asa A. Schaeffer, Temple University Herman T. Spieth, College of the City of New York 'Charles R. Stockard, Cornell University Medical College W. W. Swingle, Princeton University Ivon R. Taylor, Brown University Harold C. Urey, Columbia University H.
    [Show full text]
  • Calendar Is Brought to You By…
    A Celebration of Canadian Healthcare Research Healthcare Canadian of Celebration A A Celebration of Canadian Healthcare Research Healthcare Canadian of Celebration A ea 000 0 20 ar Ye ea 00 0 2 ar Ye present . present present . present The Alumni and Friends of the Medical Research Council (MRC) Canada and Partners in Research in Partners and Canada (MRC) Council Research Medical the of Friends and Alumni The The Alumni and Friends of the Medical Research Council (MRC) Canada and Partners in Research in Partners and Canada (MRC) Council Research Medical the of Friends and Alumni The The Association of Canadian Medical Colleges, The Association of Canadian Teaching Hospitals, Teaching Canadian of Association The Colleges, Medical Canadian of Association The The Association of Canadian Medical Colleges, The Association of Canadian Teaching Hospitals, Teaching Canadian of Association The Colleges, Medical Canadian of Association The For further information please contact: The Dean of Medicine at any of Canada’s 16 medical schools (see list on inside front cover) and/or the Vice-President, Research at any of Canada’s 34 teaching hospitals (see list on inside front cover). • Dr. A. Angel, President • Alumni and Friends of MRC Canada e-mail address: [email protected] • Phone: (204) 787-3381 • Ron Calhoun, Executive Director • Partners in Research e-mail address: [email protected] • Phone: (519) 433-7866 Produced by: Linda Bartz, Health Research Awareness Week Project Director, Vancouver Hospital MPA Communication Design Inc.: Elizabeth Phillips, Creative Director • Spencer MacGillivray, Production Manager Forwords Communication Inc.: Jennifer Wah, ABC, Editorial Director A.K.A. Rhino Prepress & Print PS French Translation Services: Patrice Schmidt, French Translation Manager Photographs used in this publication were derived from the private collections of various medical researchers across Canada, The Canadian Medical Hall of Fame (London, Ontario), and First Light Photography (BC and Ontario).
    [Show full text]
  • Sunnybrook Department of Medicine Annual Report 2012
    DEPARTMENT OF MEDICINE ANNUAL REPORT July 1, 2012 – June 30, 2013 Sunnybrook DEPARTMENT OF MEDICINE DEPARTMENT OF MEDICINE ANNUAL REPORT July 1, 2012 – June 30, 2013 Table of Contents MESSAGE FROM THE PHYSICIAN-IN-CHIEF 3 APPENDIXES 37 EXECUTIVE SUMMARY 4 APPENDIX I: LIST OF FACULTY 38 ABOUT US: 4 APPENDIX II: SUMMARY ACTIVITY REPORTS 40 MEMBERS OF THE EXECUTIVE COMMITTEE 6 OVERALL DEPARTMENTAL SUMMARY 41 COMMITTEE REPORTS 7 DIVISION OF CARDIOLOGY 42 DIVISION OF DERMATOLOGY 55 FACULTY 9 DIVISION OF ENDOCRINOLOGY FULL-TIME FACULTY BY DIVISION 9 AND METABOLISM 58 FULL-TIME FACULTY BY UNIVERSITY RANK 10 DIVISION OF GASTROENTEROLOGY 62 FULL-TIME FACULTY BY JOB DESCRIPTION 10 DIVISION OF GENERAL INTERNAL MEDICINE 66 NEW APPOINTMENTS 11 DIVISION OF GERIATRIC MEDICINE 77 PROMOTIONS 11 DIVISION OF INFECTIOUS DISEASES 79 2013 DEPARTMENT OF MEDICINE AWARD RECIPIENTS 12 DIVISION OF MEDICAL ONCOLOGY AND EXTERNAL LEADERSHIP POSITIONS 12 HEMATOLOGY 88 FACULTY WELL-BEING COMMITTEE 13 DIVISION OF NEPHROLOGY 110 STRATEGIC PLAN 14 DIVISION OF NEUROLOGY 116 SHORT-TERM GOALS 2013-2014 15 DIVISION OF PHYSIATRY, PHYSICAL MEDICINE AND REHABILITATION 131 DIVISION REPORTS 16 DIVISION OF RESPIROLOGY 132 CARDIOLOGY 17 DIVISION OF RHEUMATOLOGY 136 CLINICAL PHARMACOLOGY & TOXICOLOGY 19 MISSION, VISION & VALUES STATEMENTS 139 DERMATOLOGY 20 MISSION 139 ENDOCRINOLOGY 21 VISION 139 GASTROENTEROLOGY 23 VALUES 139 GENERAL INTERNAL MEDICINE 25 ORGANIZATION CHART 139 GERIATRIC MEDICINE 26 INFECTIOUS DISEASES 28 MEDICAL ONCOLOGY & CLINICAL HEMATOLOGY 29 NEPHROLOGY 30 NEUROLOGY 31 OBSTETRICAL MEDICINE 32 REHABILITATION MEDICINE 33 RESPIROLOGY 35 RHEUMATOLOGY 36 2 MESSAGE FROM THE PHYSICIAN-IN-CHIEF I am pleased to share this annual report for the 2012-13 academic year with you.
    [Show full text]
  • Chemical Reactor Design
    Chemical Reactor Design Youn-Woo Lee School of Chemical and Biological Engineering Seoul National University 155-741, 599 Gwanangro, Gwanak-gu, Seoul, Korea ywlee@snu. ac.kr http://sfpl. snu. ac. kr 第7章 化學反應裝置設計 Chemical Reactor Design Reaction Mechanisms , Pathways, Bioreactions and Bioreactors Seoul National University Objective Discuss the pseudo-steady-state-hypothesis and explain how it can be used to solve reaction engineering problems Write reaction pathways for complex reactions. Explain what an enzyme is and how it acts as a catalyst. Describe Michealis-Menten enzyme kinetics and rate law along with its temperature dependence. Discss h ow t o di stin gui sh th e diff er ent t ypes of enz yme inhibition. Discuss stages of cell growth and rate laws used to describe growth. Write material balances on cells, substrates, and products in bioreactors to size chemostats and plot concentration-time trajectoriesin batch reactors. Describe how physiologically-based pharmocokinetic models can be used to model alcohol metabolism. Seoul National University 7.1 Active Intermediates and Nonelementary Rate law • Elementary rate law - the reaction order of each species is identical with the stoichiometric coefficient of that species for the reaction as written n rA kC A • Non-elementary rate law - no direct correspondence between reaction order and stoichiometry 3 / 2 CH CHO CH + CO r kC 3 4 CH 3CHO CH 3CHO k C C 3/ 2 1 H 2 Br2 H2+Br+ Br2 2HBr rHBr CHBr k2CBr Seoul National University Non-elementary Reaction Non-elementary rate laws involve a number of elementary reactions and at least one active intermediate.
    [Show full text]
  • Enzyme Kinetics at the Molecular Level∗
    GENERAL ARTICLE Enzyme Kinetics at the Molecular Level∗ Arti Dua The celebrated Michaelis–Menten (MM) expression provides a fundamental relation between the rate of enzyme cataly- sis and substrate concentration. The validity of this classical expression is, however, restricted to macroscopic amounts of enzymes and substrates and, thus, to processes with negligi- ble fluctuations. Recent experiments have measured fluctu- ations in the catalytic rate to reveal that the MM equation, though valid for bulk amounts, is not obeyed at the molecu- Arti Dua is an Associate lar level. In this review, we show how new statistical measures Professor in the Indian of fluctuations in the catalytic rate identify a regime in which Institute of Technology Madras. She is a theoretical the MM equation is always violated. This regime, character- chemist, working in the area ized by temporal correlations between enzymatic turnovers, of stochastic reaction is absent for a single enzyme and is unobservably short in the dynamics and statistical classical limit. mechanics of complex fluids. 1. Classical Enzyme Kinetics Enzymes are biological catalysts that accelerate chemical reac- tions manyfold, without getting consumed in the catalytic pro- cess. Several biological processes involving the conversion of substrates to products, thus, rely crucially on the catalytic activity of enzymes. Specific enzymes control and regulate a wide range of life-sustaining processes that vary from digestion, metabolism, absorption, and blood clotting to reproduction. While specificity Keywords depends on the detailed chemical structure of enzyme proteins, Biological catalysts, enzymes, rate kinetics, stochastic enzyme the rate at which the enzymes carry out the catalytic conversion kinetics, Michaelis–Menten depends less on their chemical structure but more on the physical mechanism, enzymatic velocity, parameters, including the amounts of enzymes, substrates, tem- molecular noise.
    [Show full text]
  • By the Numbers Excellence, Innovation, Leadership: Research at the University of Toronto a Powerful Partnership
    BY THE NUMBERS EXCELLENCE, INNOVATION, LEADERSHIP: RESEARCH AT THE UNIVERSITY OF TORONTO A POWERFUL PARTNERSHIP The combination of U of T and the 10 partner hospitals affiliated with the university creates one of the world’s largest and most innovative health research forces. More than 1,900 researchers and over 4,000 graduate students and postdoctoral fellows pursue the next vital steps in every area of health research imaginable. UNIVERSITY OF TORONTO Sunnybrook Health St. Michaelʼs Sciences Centre Hospital Womenʼs College Bloorview Kids Hospital Rehab A POWERFUL PARTNERSHIP Baycrest Mount Sinai Hospital The Hospital University Health for Sick Children Network* Centre for Toronto Addiction and Rehabilitation Mental Health Institute *Composed of Toronto General, Toronto Western and Princess Margaret Hospitals 1 UNIVERSITY OF TORONTO FACULTY EXCELLENCE U of T researchers consistently win more prestigious awards than any other Canadian university. See the end of this booklet for a detailed list of awards and honours received by our faculty in the last three years. Faculty Honours (1980-2009) University of Toronto compared to awards held at other Canadian universities International American Academy of Arts & Sciences* Gairdner International Award Guggenheim Fellows National Academies** Royal Society Fellows Sloan Research Fellows American Association for the Advancement of Science* ISI Highly-Cited Researchers*** 0 20 40 60 801 00 Percentage National Steacie Prize Molson Prize Federal Granting Councilsʼ Highest Awards**** Killam Prize Steacie
    [Show full text]