Helmut Sies

Helmut Sies is a German physician, biochemist and university professor. He was the first to demonstrate the existence of hydrogen peroxide as a normal attribute of aerobic life in 1970,[1] and he introduced the concept of Oxidative stress[2] in 1985. He also worked on the biological strategies of antioxidant defense[3] and the biochemistry of nutritional antioxidants (e.g., selenium, carotenoids, flavonoids, polyphenols).

Personal

Professor Sies was born March 28, 1942, in Goslar, Germany. He grew up in Seesen/Harz, Germany, attended Elementary School 1948-1952, and Gymnasium (Jacobson School) 1952-1961. He was a High School Exchange student (1959-1960) with the Michigan Council of Churches, in Pleasant Plain, Ohio, and in Kankakee, Illinois, where he graduated from Kankakee High School in 1960. He was married to Dr. Claudia Sies, born Neumann, (1967-1983). They have two children (Alexander, Art Gallerist (www.sieshoeke.com); Caroline). He is married to Dr. Nancy Sies, born Kim (1990- ), they also have two children (Katharina, MD; Audrey).

Career

He was a student at Leibniz-Kolleg at Tübingen for 'studium generale' in 1961. He studied medicine at the University of Tübingen, the Ludwig Maximilians University of Munich, and in Paris. In 1967 he received his medical doctorate summa cum laude at Munich, where he worked at the Institute of Physiological Chemistry from 1968. In 1972 he habilitated in Munich for Physiological Chemistry and Physical Biochemistry with the thesis, "Biochemistry of the Peroxisome in the Liver Cell", and in 1978 became professor. From 1979 until 2008 he was professor and chairman at the Institute of Biochemistry and Molecular Biology I, Heinrich_Heine_University_Düsseldorf. He has been a visiting professor at the University of California at Berkeley, the University of Texas at Austin the Heart Research Institute in Sydney, the University of Siena, the University of Southern California, and the King Saud University in Riyadh. Since 2008 he is emeritus professor at the Institute of Biochemistry and Molecular Biology I, Heinrich Heine University Düsseldorf, and Senior Scientist at the Leibniz Institute for Environmental Medicine, Düsseldorf, Germany.[4]

Investigating biological redox reactions,[5] he identified hydrogen peroxide as a normal constituent of aerobic life in eukaryotic cells.[1] This finding led to developments that recognized the essential role of hydrogen peroxide in metabolic redox control. Further research included studies on glutathione,[6] toxicological aspects (the concept of “redox cycling”),[7] biochemical pharmacology (Ebselen),[8] nutritional biochemistry and micronutrients (selenium, carotenoids, flavonoids), and the concept of “Oxidative Stress”.[2][9]

He found that Lycopene, a carotenoid common in tomatoes, works as an antioxidant by quenching singlet molecular oxygen,[10] and that lycopene and other carotenoids, as well as some flavonoids, protect the skin from damage from sunlight.[11] Working with clinicians, he found that cocoa flavanols are beneficial for the cardiovascular system[12][13]

He pointed out that epidemiology can generate interest for further analysis, but that epidemiological association of parameters cannot prove cause-effect relationships. The striking example was the almost perfect correlation (r = 0.982) between the number of brooding storks and the number of newborn babies in then West Germany:[14] every child in Germany knows that 'storks bring babies'!

He was named “Redox Pioneer”.[4]

Awards

Roles

References
  1. Sies, Helmut; Chance, Britton (1 December 1970). "The steady state level of catalase compound I in isolated hemoglobin-free perfused rat liver". FEBS Letters. 11 (3): 172–176. doi:10.1016/0014-5793(70)80521-X. PMID 11945479. S2CID 32353421.
  2. Sies, Helmut (1985). Oxidative stress. London: Orlando. p. 1-8. ISBN 9781483289113. Retrieved 17 January 2022.
  3. Sies, Helmut (July 1993). "Strategies of antioxidant defense". European Journal of Biochemistry. 215 (2): 213–219. doi:10.1111/j.1432-1033.1993.tb18025.x. PMID 7688300.
  4. Jones, Dean P.; Radi, Rafael (20 December 2014). "Redox Pioneer: Professor Helmut Sies". Antioxidants & Redox Signaling. 21 (18): 2459–2468. doi:10.1089/ars.2014.6037. PMC 4245851. PMID 25178739.
  5. Sies, Helmut (September 2020). "Findings in redox biology: From H2O2 to oxidative stress". Journal of Biological Chemistry. 295 (39): 13458–13473. doi:10.1074/jbc.X120.015651. PMC 7521638. PMID 32978328.
  6. Sies, Helmut (November 1999). "Glutathione and its role in cellular functions". Free Radical Biology and Medicine. 27 (9–10): 916–921. doi:10.1016/S0891-5849(99)00177-X. PMID 10569624.
  7. Kappus, Hermann; Sies, Helmut (December 1981). "Toxic drug effects associated with oxygen metabolism: Redox cycling and lipid peroxidation". Experientia. 37 (12): 1233–1241. doi:10.1007/BF01948335. PMID 7035210. S2CID 23991550.
  8. Müller, Armin; Cadenas, Enrique; Graf, Peter; Sies, Helmut (October 1984). "A novel biologically active seleno-organic compound—1". Biochemical Pharmacology. 33 (20): 3235–3239. doi:10.1016/0006-2952(84)90083-2. PMID 6487370.
  9. Sies, Helmut; Berndt, Carsten; Jones, Dean P. (20 June 2017). "Oxidative Stress". Annual Review of Biochemistry. 86 (1): 715–748. doi:10.1146/annurev-biochem-061516-045037. PMID 28441057. S2CID 25011655.
  10. Di Mascio, Paolo; Kaiser, Stephan; Sies, Helmut (November 1989). "Lycopene as the most efficient biological carotenoid singlet oxygen quencher". Archives of Biochemistry and Biophysics. 274 (2): 532–538. doi:10.1016/0003-9861(89)90467-0. PMID 2802626.
  11. Sies, Helmut; Stahl, Wilhelm (14 July 2004). "Nutritional protection against skin damage from sunlight". Annual Review of Nutrition. 24 (1): 173–200. doi:10.1146/annurev.nutr.24.012003.132320. PMID 15189118.
  12. Heiss, C. (27 August 2003). "Vascular Effects of Cocoa Rich in Flavan-3-ols". JAMA: The Journal of the American Medical Association. 290 (8): 1030–1031. doi:10.1001/jama.290.8.1030. PMID 12941674.
  13. Schroeter, H.; Heiss, C.; Balzer, J.; Kleinbongard, P.; Keen, C. L.; Hollenberg, N. K.; Sies, H.; Kwik-Uribe, C.; Schmitz, H. H.; Kelm, M. (24 January 2006). "(-)-Epicatechin mediates beneficial effects of flavanol-rich cocoa on vascular function in humans". Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences. 103 (4): 1024–1029. Bibcode:2006PNAS..103.1024S. doi:10.1073/pnas.0510168103. PMC 1327732. PMID 16418281.
  14. Sies, Helmut (7 April 1988). "A new parameter for sex education". Nature. 332 (6164): 495. Bibcode:1988Natur.332..495S. doi:10.1038/332495a0. S2CID 7259962.
Sources
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