Vittorio Erspamer
Encyclopedia
Vittorio Erspamer was an Italian pharmacologist and chemist, known for the identification, synthesis and pharmacological studies of more than sixty new chemical compounds, most notably serotonin
and octopamine
.
, a municipality of Trentino in northern Italy
. He attended school in the Roman Catholic Archdiocese of Trento
and then moved to Pavia
, where he studied at Ghislieri College
, graduating in medicine and surgery in 1935. He then took the post of assistant professor in anatomy
and physiology
at the University of Pavia
– one of the oldest universities in Europe, founded in 1361. In 1936, he obtained a scholarship to study at the Institute of Pharmacology at the University of Berlin
. After returning to Italy in 1939, he moved to Rome where he took up the position of professor in pharmacology
. In Rome, the focus of his research shifted to drugs and he used his past biological experience to focus on compounds isolated from animal tissues. In 1947 he became professor of pharmacology at the Faculty of Medicine at the University of Bari
. In 1955, he moved from Bari
to Parma
, to assume an equivalent position of professor of pharmacology at the Faculty of Medicine, University of Parma
. Erspamer was one of the first Italian pharmacologists to realize that fruitful scientific research benefits from building a relationship with the chemical and pharmaceutical industries. In the late 1950s, he established a collaboration with chemists at the Farmitalia company. The collaboration was useful, not only for the analysis of the structure of new molecules which he isolated and characterized pharmacologically, but also for the subsequent industrial synthesis of these chemicals and their synthetic analogs.
Thanks to funding received from Farmitalia, over the years Erspamer collected more than five hundred species of marine organisms from all around the world, including amphibian
s, shellfish
, sea anemone
s and other species. For this purpose, he spent much time in traveling, and was known among his colleagues for his careful preparation of expeditions and knowledge of geography. Using these world-wide observations he developed a theory of geo-phylogenetic
correlations among the different amphibian species of the world, which was based on analysis of the peptide
s and amine
s in their skin.
The research activities of Erspamer spanned more than 60 years and resulted in the isolation, identification, synthesis and pharmacological study of more than sixty new chemical compounds, especially polypeptides and biogenic amine
s, but also some alkaloid
s. Most of these compounds were isolated from animals, predominantly amphibians. In the late fifties his research shifted to peptide
s. In the laboratories of the Institute of Medical Pharmacology, University of Rome, he isolated from amphibians and mollusks more than fifty new bioactive peptides. These became the subjects of numerous studies in other laboratories in Europe and North America. In 1979, he focused on opioid peptide
s specific to Phyllomedusa
, a genus
of tree frog from Central
and South America
. These were used by the native Indians in initiation rites, to increase their prowess as "hunters" and make them feel "invincible". They applied secretions from the skin of these frogs that resulted in euphoric
and analgesic
effects. The peptides studied by Erspamer have become essential to characterize the functional role of opioid receptors.
Erspamer retired from administrative positions in 1984 because of the age limits, but continued his research and writing until his death in Rome in 1999. His last, unfinished review was completed by his collaborators and published in 2002. During his lifetime he was twice nominated for the Nobel Prize
.
Erspamer was married to his long-time colleague (at least 1962-1999) Giuliana Falconieri Erspamer, who was among the committee members who organised a workshop held in his memory in 2009.
histochemical
characteristics of enterochromaffin cells using advanced techniques, not normally used at that time, such as diazo reaction
s, Wood's lamp and fluorescence microscopy
. In 1935, he showed that an extract prepared from enterochromaffin cells made intestinal tissue contract. Other chemists believed the extract contained adrenaline, but two years later Erspamer demonstrated that it was a previously unknown chemical, an amine
, which he named enteramine. In 1948, Maurice M. Rapport, Arda Green, and Irvine Page
of the Cleveland Clinic
discovered a vasoconstrictor substance in blood serum
, and since it was a serum agent affecting vascular tone, they named it serotonin
. In 1952 it was shown that enteramine was the same substance as serotonin. Another important chemical, also an amine, was discovered by Erspamer in 1948, in the salivary glands of the octopus
, and therefore named by him octopamine
.
Serotonin
Serotonin or 5-hydroxytryptamine is a monoamine neurotransmitter. Biochemically derived from tryptophan, serotonin is primarily found in the gastrointestinal tract, platelets, and in the central nervous system of animals including humans...
and octopamine
Octopamine
Octopamine is an endogenous biogenic amine that is closely related to norepinephrine, and has effects on the adrenergic and dopaminergic systems. It is also found naturally in numerous plants, including bitter orange. Biosynthesis of the D--enantiomer of octopamine is by β-hydroxylation of...
.
Biography
Erspamer was born in 1909 in the small village of Val di Non in MaloscoMalosco
Malosco is a comune in Trentino in the northern Italian region Trentino-Alto Adige/Südtirol, located about north of Trento. As of 31 December 2004, it had a population of 368 and an area of 6.8 km².-History:...
, a municipality of Trentino in northern Italy
Italy
Italy , officially the Italian Republic languages]] under the European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages. In each of these, Italy's official name is as follows:;;;;;;;;), is a unitary parliamentary republic in South-Central Europe. To the north it borders France, Switzerland, Austria and...
. He attended school in the Roman Catholic Archdiocese of Trento
Roman Catholic Archdiocese of Trento
The Italian Catholic archdiocese of Trento, in the Triveneto, was created by the elevation in 1929 of the historical diocese of Trento, which as the bishopric of Trent had formed a state of the Holy Roman Empire. The archdiocese became a metropolitan see in 1964, and has the diocese of...
and then moved to Pavia
Pavia
Pavia , the ancient Ticinum, is a town and comune of south-western Lombardy, northern Italy, 35 km south of Milan on the lower Ticino river near its confluence with the Po. It is the capital of the province of Pavia. It has a population of c. 71,000...
, where he studied at Ghislieri College
Ghislieri College
The Ghislieri College , founded in 1567 by Pope Pius V and inspired by the Almo Collegio Borromeo, is the second the most ancient colleges in Pavia and co-founder of the IUSS, located in Pavia as well....
, graduating in medicine and surgery in 1935. He then took the post of assistant professor in anatomy
Anatomy
Anatomy is a branch of biology and medicine that is the consideration of the structure of living things. It is a general term that includes human anatomy, animal anatomy , and plant anatomy...
and physiology
Physiology
Physiology is the science of the function of living systems. This includes how organisms, organ systems, organs, cells, and bio-molecules carry out the chemical or physical functions that exist in a living system. The highest honor awarded in physiology is the Nobel Prize in Physiology or...
at the University of Pavia
University of Pavia
The University of Pavia is a university located in Pavia, Lombardy, Italy. It was founded in 1361 and is organized in 9 Faculties.-History:...
– one of the oldest universities in Europe, founded in 1361. In 1936, he obtained a scholarship to study at the Institute of Pharmacology at the University of Berlin
Humboldt University of Berlin
The Humboldt University of Berlin is Berlin's oldest university, founded in 1810 as the University of Berlin by the liberal Prussian educational reformer and linguist Wilhelm von Humboldt, whose university model has strongly influenced other European and Western universities...
. After returning to Italy in 1939, he moved to Rome where he took up the position of professor in pharmacology
Pharmacology
Pharmacology is the branch of medicine and biology concerned with the study of drug action. More specifically, it is the study of the interactions that occur between a living organism and chemicals that affect normal or abnormal biochemical function...
. In Rome, the focus of his research shifted to drugs and he used his past biological experience to focus on compounds isolated from animal tissues. In 1947 he became professor of pharmacology at the Faculty of Medicine at the University of Bari
University of Bari
The University of Bari is a university located in Bari, Italy. It was founded in 1925 and is organized in 12 Faculties.-Organization:These are the 13 faculties in which the university is divided into:* Faculty of Agricultural Science...
. In 1955, he moved from Bari
Bari
Bari is the capital city of the province of Bari and of the Apulia region, on the Adriatic Sea, in Italy. It is the second most important economic centre of mainland Southern Italy after Naples, and is well known as a port and university city, as well as the city of Saint Nicholas...
to Parma
Parma
Parma is a city in the Italian region of Emilia-Romagna famous for its ham, its cheese, its architecture and the fine countryside around it. This is the home of the University of Parma, one of the oldest universities in the world....
, to assume an equivalent position of professor of pharmacology at the Faculty of Medicine, University of Parma
University of Parma
The University of Parma is one of the oldest universities in the world, founded in the 11th century. It is organised in twelve faculties. The University of Parma has currently about 30,000 students.-History:...
. Erspamer was one of the first Italian pharmacologists to realize that fruitful scientific research benefits from building a relationship with the chemical and pharmaceutical industries. In the late 1950s, he established a collaboration with chemists at the Farmitalia company. The collaboration was useful, not only for the analysis of the structure of new molecules which he isolated and characterized pharmacologically, but also for the subsequent industrial synthesis of these chemicals and their synthetic analogs.
Thanks to funding received from Farmitalia, over the years Erspamer collected more than five hundred species of marine organisms from all around the world, including amphibian
Amphibian
Amphibians , are a class of vertebrate animals including animals such as toads, frogs, caecilians, and salamanders. They are characterized as non-amniote ectothermic tetrapods...
s, shellfish
Shellfish
Shellfish is a culinary and fisheries term for exoskeleton-bearing aquatic invertebrates used as food, including various species of molluscs, crustaceans, and echinoderms. Although most kinds of shellfish are harvested from saltwater environments, some kinds are found only in freshwater...
, sea anemone
Sea anemone
Sea anemones are a group of water-dwelling, predatory animals of the order Actiniaria; they are named after the anemone, a terrestrial flower. Sea anemones are classified in the phylum Cnidaria, class Anthozoa, subclass Zoantharia. Anthozoa often have large polyps that allow for digestion of larger...
s and other species. For this purpose, he spent much time in traveling, and was known among his colleagues for his careful preparation of expeditions and knowledge of geography. Using these world-wide observations he developed a theory of geo-phylogenetic
Phylogenetics
In biology, phylogenetics is the study of evolutionary relatedness among groups of organisms , which is discovered through molecular sequencing data and morphological data matrices...
correlations among the different amphibian species of the world, which was based on analysis of the peptide
Peptide
Peptides are short polymers of amino acid monomers linked by peptide bonds. They are distinguished from proteins on the basis of size, typically containing less than 50 monomer units. The shortest peptides are dipeptides, consisting of two amino acids joined by a single peptide bond...
s and amine
Amine
Amines are organic compounds and functional groups that contain a basic nitrogen atom with a lone pair. Amines are derivatives of ammonia, wherein one or more hydrogen atoms have been replaced by a substituent such as an alkyl or aryl group. Important amines include amino acids, biogenic amines,...
s in their skin.
The research activities of Erspamer spanned more than 60 years and resulted in the isolation, identification, synthesis and pharmacological study of more than sixty new chemical compounds, especially polypeptides and biogenic amine
Biogenic amine
-Examples:Some prominent examples of biogenic amines include:* Histamine - a substance derived from the amino acid histidine that acts as a neurotransmitter mediating arousal and attention, as well as a pro-inflammatory signal released from mast cells in response to allergic reactions or tissue...
s, but also some alkaloid
Alkaloid
Alkaloids are a group of naturally occurring chemical compounds that contain mostly basic nitrogen atoms. This group also includes some related compounds with neutral and even weakly acidic properties. Also some synthetic compounds of similar structure are attributed to alkaloids...
s. Most of these compounds were isolated from animals, predominantly amphibians. In the late fifties his research shifted to peptide
Peptide
Peptides are short polymers of amino acid monomers linked by peptide bonds. They are distinguished from proteins on the basis of size, typically containing less than 50 monomer units. The shortest peptides are dipeptides, consisting of two amino acids joined by a single peptide bond...
s. In the laboratories of the Institute of Medical Pharmacology, University of Rome, he isolated from amphibians and mollusks more than fifty new bioactive peptides. These became the subjects of numerous studies in other laboratories in Europe and North America. In 1979, he focused on opioid peptide
Opioid peptide
Opioid peptides are short sequences of amino acids that bind to opioid receptors in the brain; opiates and opioids mimic the effect of these peptides. Opioid peptides may be produced by the body itself, for example endorphins. The effects of these peptides vary, but they all resemble opiates...
s specific to Phyllomedusa
Phyllomedusa
Phyllomedusa is a genus of tree frog from Central and South America. It ranges from Costa Rica southward to Argentina. It has around thirty species.-Secretion:...
, a genus
Genus
In biology, a genus is a low-level taxonomic rank used in the biological classification of living and fossil organisms, which is an example of definition by genus and differentia...
of tree frog from Central
Central America
Central America is the central geographic region of the Americas. It is the southernmost, isthmian portion of the North American continent, which connects with South America on the southeast. When considered part of the unified continental model, it is considered a subcontinent...
and South America
South America
South America is a continent situated in the Western Hemisphere, mostly in the Southern Hemisphere, with a relatively small portion in the Northern Hemisphere. The continent is also considered a subcontinent of the Americas. It is bordered on the west by the Pacific Ocean and on the north and east...
. These were used by the native Indians in initiation rites, to increase their prowess as "hunters" and make them feel "invincible". They applied secretions from the skin of these frogs that resulted in euphoric
Euphoria
Euphoria is an emotional and mental state defined as a sense of great elation and well being.Euphoria may also refer to:* Euphoria , a genus of scarab beetles* Euphoria, a genus name previously used for the longan and other trees...
and analgesic
Analgesic
An analgesic is any member of the group of drugs used to relieve pain . The word analgesic derives from Greek an- and algos ....
effects. The peptides studied by Erspamer have become essential to characterize the functional role of opioid receptors.
Erspamer retired from administrative positions in 1984 because of the age limits, but continued his research and writing until his death in Rome in 1999. His last, unfinished review was completed by his collaborators and published in 2002. During his lifetime he was twice nominated for the Nobel Prize
Nobel Prize
The Nobel Prizes are annual international awards bestowed by Scandinavian committees in recognition of cultural and scientific advances. The will of the Swedish chemist Alfred Nobel, the inventor of dynamite, established the prizes in 1895...
.
Erspamer was married to his long-time colleague (at least 1962-1999) Giuliana Falconieri Erspamer, who was among the committee members who organised a workshop held in his memory in 2009.
Important discoveries
Between 1933 and 1934, while still a college student, Erspamer published his first work on thehistochemical
Histology
Histology is the study of the microscopic anatomy of cells and tissues of plants and animals. It is performed by examining cells and tissues commonly by sectioning and staining; followed by examination under a light microscope or electron microscope...
characteristics of enterochromaffin cells using advanced techniques, not normally used at that time, such as diazo reaction
Diazo
Diazo refers to a type of organic compound called diazo compound that has two linked nitrogen atoms as a terminal functional group. The general formula is R2C=N2. The simplest example of a diazo compound is diazomethane...
s, Wood's lamp and fluorescence microscopy
Fluorescence microscope
A fluorescence microscope is an optical microscope used to study properties of organic or inorganic substances using the phenomena of fluorescence and phosphorescence instead of, or in addition to, reflection and absorption...
. In 1935, he showed that an extract prepared from enterochromaffin cells made intestinal tissue contract. Other chemists believed the extract contained adrenaline, but two years later Erspamer demonstrated that it was a previously unknown chemical, an amine
Amine
Amines are organic compounds and functional groups that contain a basic nitrogen atom with a lone pair. Amines are derivatives of ammonia, wherein one or more hydrogen atoms have been replaced by a substituent such as an alkyl or aryl group. Important amines include amino acids, biogenic amines,...
, which he named enteramine. In 1948, Maurice M. Rapport, Arda Green, and Irvine Page
Irvine Page
Irvine Heinly Page was born in Indianapolis, Indiana and was an American physiologist who played an important part in the field of hypertension for almost 60 years....
of the Cleveland Clinic
Cleveland Clinic
The Cleveland Clinic is a multispecialty academic medical center located in Cleveland, Ohio, United States. The Cleveland Clinic is currently regarded as one of the top 4 hospitals in the United States as rated by U.S. News & World Report...
discovered a vasoconstrictor substance in blood serum
Blood plasma
Blood plasma is the straw-colored liquid component of blood in which the blood cells in whole blood are normally suspended. It makes up about 55% of the total blood volume. It is the intravascular fluid part of extracellular fluid...
, and since it was a serum agent affecting vascular tone, they named it serotonin
Serotonin
Serotonin or 5-hydroxytryptamine is a monoamine neurotransmitter. Biochemically derived from tryptophan, serotonin is primarily found in the gastrointestinal tract, platelets, and in the central nervous system of animals including humans...
. In 1952 it was shown that enteramine was the same substance as serotonin. Another important chemical, also an amine, was discovered by Erspamer in 1948, in the salivary glands of the octopus
Octopus
The octopus is a cephalopod mollusc of the order Octopoda. Octopuses have two eyes and four pairs of arms, and like other cephalopods they are bilaterally symmetric. An octopus has a hard beak, with its mouth at the center point of the arms...
, and therefore named by him octopamine
Octopamine
Octopamine is an endogenous biogenic amine that is closely related to norepinephrine, and has effects on the adrenergic and dopaminergic systems. It is also found naturally in numerous plants, including bitter orange. Biosynthesis of the D--enantiomer of octopamine is by β-hydroxylation of...
.