This Award was initiated in 1976 by long-time Section member Dr. Desider A. Pragay to honor two fellow Hungarian-American clinical biochemists. They were originally instituted as two separate awards, the Somogyi Award and the Sendroy Award, and quickly evolved to the current Somogyi-Sendroy Award. This award recognizes contributions to the field of clinical chemistry and is made annually at the at the fall meeting. It consists of a certificate and honorarium [currently $250 (US)].
2021: Judy Sterry, Zhimin Tim Cao
2020: Not Awarded
2019: Eleftherios P. Diamandis
2018: Not Awarded
2017: Neil Greenberg; Robert Rej
2016: Not Awarded
2015: Not Awarded
2014: Not Awarded
2013: Not Awarded
2012: Not Awarded
2011: Donald Powers
2010: Tai Kwong
2009: Valerie Bush
2008: Christine Collier
2007: David Hohnadel
2006: Raymond E. Vanderlinde
2005: John Bernard Henry
2004: Theodore Peters, Jr
2003: Matthew J. McQueen
2002: Bernard R. Brody
2001: Roberta Reed
2000: Royden N. Rand
1997: Patricia Drake
1996: Robert Hill
1995: Roberta Reed
1992: Daniel A. Nealon
1991: Arlene Crowe
1990: Graham Ellis
1989: Norman P. Kubaski
1988: David B. Tonks
1987: Thomas G. Rosando
1986: Steven J. Soldin
1985: Leila Edwards
1984: Desider A. Pragay
1983: Max E. Chilcote
1982: A. G. Gornall
1981: Paul M. Keene
1980: Edward S. Gill
1979: James Salvatore
1978: W.H.C. Walker
1977: Martin H Murray (Sendroy), Royden N. Rand (Somogyi)
1976: Robert Reg (Sendroy), Theodore Peters, Jr (Somogyi)
Michael Somogyi (1883-1971)
Michael Somogyi was born on 7 March 1883 in the village Reinersdorf in what was then the Empire of Austria Hungary. He graduated in chemistry from the University of Budapest in 1905 and then went to America. At first he had trouble finding suitable work, but eventually he obtained a position as assistant of biochemistry at the Cornell University Medical College, NY where he was active until 1908. That year Somogyi returned to Budapest to become chief chemist at the municipal laboratory. He obtained a doctorate from the University of Budapest in 1914.
In 1922 his colleague, P. A. Schaffer at the Cornell University, persuaded him to return to the USA to become teacher of biochemistry at the Washington University's medical school in St. Louis. In 1926 he became first chemist at the Jewish Hospital, St. Louis. The first insulin treatment of a child with diabetes in the USA in October 1922 was done with a preparation of insulin produced by Somogyi. In 1926, his first year working as a clinical chemist in St. Louis, he introduced a method for determining reducing sugars in human blood. He took a special interest in diabetic patients and in 1938, at a meeting of the medical society in St. Louis to the theme of "unstable, severe diabetic patients", Somogyi first presented his theory that insulin treatment in itself might cause unstable diabetes. In 1940 he developed a method for the determination of serum amylase in healthy and diabetic individuals. He is also credited with devising a test for acute pancreatitis. Somogyi was active at the Jewish Hospital, St. Louis, until his retirement in 1957. He died from a stroke on 21 July 1971.
Julius Sendroy, Jr. 1900-1982
Julius Sendroy was born in Zombor, Hungary, on 26 September 26 1900. However, he received most of his collegiate training United States; his B.S. in 1923 from City College, New York and both his M.A. and Ph.D. in biochemistry from Columbia University (1925 and 1926). Thereafter, he held concurrent appointments as Guest Scientist at Cambridge University and at The Kaiser Wilhelm Institute of Biology in Germany in 1928.
On his return to the U.S., he joined the staff of the Rockefeller Institute as assistant chemist, and during the next 11 years he advanced steadily. He became a US citizen in 1932 and in 1937 he left Rockefeller to become a professor of chemistry and head of the Department of Experimental Medicine at the School of Medicine of Loyola University, in Illinois. Sendroy's research interests centered around the physical chemistry of the blood gases and electrolytes, acid base balance, respiratory physiology, and the biochemistry of stress.
During World War II, Sendroy served as a consultant in the chemical warfare laboratories of the United States Army. In 1948, he came to the Washington area to begin his long association with the Naval Medical Research Institute in Bethesda as its Chief Chemist. From 1960 to 1966 he also served as a Scientific and as a Special Science Assistant to the Bureau of Medicine' Surgery in the Department of Medicine for the U.S. Navy. When he retired in 1977, he and his wife, Jeanette, moved to San Diego, where he could still serve as a consultant to the Navy.
Throughout his career, Dr. Sendroy participated actively in professional affairs directed at furthering the science and of clinical chemistry. He was a director of the National Registry in Clinical Chemistry and a member of the Committee on Chemistry of the Chemistry and Chemical Technology Division of the National Research Council. For many years, he served as member of the Board of Examiners for scientific and technical personnel for the United States Civil Service Commission. He served on the Biochemistry Study Section for the National Institutes of Health, and for three years, during its period of activity, was chairman of the National Institutes of Health Symposium Committee on Instrumentation.
He was a member of the Board of Editors of Clinical Chemistry from 1961 to 1966, serving as Chairman from 1963 to 1966. He was the sixteenth President (1964-1965) of the the Association for Diagnostics & Laboratory Medicine (formerly AACC). He received many honors and awards during his distinguished career including election to the Phi Beta Kappa Scholastic Fraternity, an honorary Sc.D. from St. Bonaventure University in 1964, the Van Slyke Award in 1962 by the New York Metropolitan Section, the Association for Diagnostics & Laboratory Medicine (ADLM), and the National ADLM Ames Award in 1968 in recognition of his outstanding contributions to clinical chemistry.
Reference: Melville RS. A tribute to Julius Sendroy Jr. 1900-1982. Clin Chem 1983;29:2114