Download PDF - The Pancreapedia

with his researchers and provided help if needed.
He often visited my laboratory, if he was in town
(a seldom occasion), to discuss the ongoing and
future research. We were both peers and friends
and he often treated me to lunch on these visits.
In fact, he was the only witness of my marriage to
Ms. Adelheid Guldiman, the present Dr. Adi Pour.
At that time, our main focus was on a relationship
between the structure and target of selected
carcinogens. In collaboration with Dr. Ulrich Mohr
from Hannover and Dr. F.W. Kruger from the
Deutsche Krebsforshung Zentrum (German’s
Cancer Research Center), several related nitroso
compounds, all synthesized specifically for our
group at the Eppley Institute, were being tested
for their carcinogenic potency. At that time, the
histological evaluation of tissues was timely and
exhaustive, since almost all tissues of the
hamsters, treated and untreated controls,
including brain, nasal cavities, spinal cord, bones
and skin (between 50-120 slides per hamster),
were taken.
One day, I was going through thousands of slides
from hamsters treated with carcinogens. In one of
the serial sections of the pancreas I noticed
changes that I had never seen before in any
hamster, rat or mouse. I was photographing the
lesion when I was asked by Dr. Shubik to see him
in his office. He was little agitated and said,
“Everybody is looking for a model for pancreatic
viii
cancer. You know, the incidence of this disease
has increased here, in Europe and Japan and
nobody has any clue as to why. There is no model
for pancreatic cancer that I know of. I thought you
may know it. There is a lot of NCI support for such
a model. Have you some ideas about it? Can we
develop one?”
- I replied, “Dr. Shubik, we do not need to find
one, I think we already have one.”
He looked at me as if I was out of my mind and
thought that, with my small knowledge of English,
I may have misunderstood him.
-“What do you mean we already have one?” he
said.
-“I was just about to photograph a pancreatic
ductal adenocarcinoma, identical to that in
humans before coming to your office.”
-“Are you serious? Show it to me.”
Minutes later, after looking at the slide with his
own microscope in his office, he jumped up from
his chair and said, “Congratulations! Could you
publish it as soon as possible?”
The serial sectioning was the foundation of the 40
years of research that provides the data in this
book. Because of this historic day, I became a
long-term faculty member of our university and a
permanent resident in Omaha.