Péter Gál

Biography

Péter Gál is working as a professor at Semmelweis University

Research Interest

Inflammatory diseases cause severe health problems and in many cases there are no appropriate therapies for them. This is caused by the lack of knowledge regarding the exact mechanism of the inflammation and the molecules potentially targeted by medicine. The cooperation between the Hungarian Academy of Sciences’ Research Centre of Natural Sciences and the Research Lab of Semmelweis University’s 3rd Department of Internal Medicine has resulted in the discovery of a new and potentially significant inflammatory process. It was detected that the protease MASP-1, the enzyme in the blood responsible for the initiation of the complement system’s lectin pathway, is able to activate endothelial cells. In this case MASP-1 functions as a hormone; it transmits external signals (eg. a wound, the presence of extraneous cells) towards the core of the cell via its interaction with cell surface receptors (G-protein coupled). Along with this research selective inhibitors not present in nature were developed against the enzymes of the lectine pathway. Three research groups work together within the Synergy programme to better explore and understand the newly identified inflammatory process. The main focus of the research is to determine whether the adhesion molecule pattern of endothelial cells is changed by the aforementioned signal transmitting process. This is a prerequisite for white blood cells taking part in the inflammation to exit the blood vessel. It is also studied, whether a sufficiently strong adhesion enabling extravasation is created between the endothelial cells activated by MASP-1 and the neutrophil granulocytes.