Ricardo Renzo Brentani, Italian-born Brazilian clinical biochemist (Trieste, Friuli-Veneza Giulia 21 July 1937 – São Paulo 29 November 2011)

From Italian, Jewish and Austrian ancestry

Performed studies on cancer biochemistry and cytology

Authored about 200 papers with more than 5,000 citations

DISCOVERIES/METHODS

Demonstrated the presence of messenger RNA in nucleolus

With I. Raw & M. Brentani. Role of nucleolar ribonucleic acid in incorporation of ribosomal amino acid. Nature 201:1130, 1964

With G. Vignolas & L.C.U. Junqueira. A simple and sensitive method for the quantitative estimation of collagen. Anal. Biochem. 94:96-9, 1979

Developed Picrosirius polarization method or Junqueira staining

With G. Vignolas & L.C.U. Junqueira. Picrosirius staining of polarization microscopy, a specific method for collagen detection in tissue sections. Histochem. Journal 11: 447-55, 1979

Demonstrated the collagen macromolecular orientation in basement membrane

With L.C.U. Junqueira, G.S. Montes, O.M.S.Toledo et al. Evidence for collagen molecular orientation in basement membranes. Histochem. J. 15:785-94, 1983 

Showed the presence of laminin receptors in membrane of pathogenic Staphylococcus

First to show how Staphylococcus aureus promoted abscesses at distance (later it has been reported the same mechanism for other pathogenic organisms)

With J.D. Lopes & M. dos Reis. Presence of laminin receptors in Staphylococcus aureus. Science 229 (4710):275-7, 1985

With C.R.M. Barardi, C.L.S. Santos & L.L. Villa. A direct method for cDNA cloning employing translation-released mRNA. Brazilian Journal of Medical and Biological Research 20:313-320, 1987

Developed the complementary hydropathy theory (launched by Jan Biro in 1981)

Biological implications of complementary hydropathy of amino acids. J. Theor. Biol. 135:495-9, 1988

With V.R. Martins, E. Graner, J. Garcia Abreu, S.J. de Souza & V.M. Neto. Complementary hydropathy identifies a cellular prion protein receptor. Nature Med. 3:1376-81, 1997

With V. Martins, S. Souza & V. Moura Neto found that prion controls and organizes the information passing from outer to inner cell 

With P.J. Mintz, M. Cardó-Vila, M.G. Ozawa, A. Hajitou, R. Rangel et al. An unrecognized extracellular function for an intracellular adapter protein released from the cytoplasm into the tumour microenvironment. Proceed. Nat. Acad. Sciences USA 106:2182-7, 2009

Papers in renowned magazines

With T. Maack & M. Rabinovitch. Increase in ‘alkaline’ ribonuclease of rat kidney cortex after lysozyme and egg-white administration. Nature (London) 186:158, 1960

With M.M. Brentani & I. Raw. Messenger RNA activity of RNA purified from rat-liver nucleoli. Nature (London) 7: 687, 1966.

With M.M. Brentani & I. Raw. Messenger activity of purified RNA from rat liver nuclei. Nature (London) 214:1122-1123, 1967

With H. Samaia, J.J. Mari, H.P. Vallada, R. Moura & A.J.G. Simpson. An Inherited Prion Disease With Prolonged Course And Psychiatric Onset. Nature (London) 390:241, 1997

PATENTS/INVENTIONS

With L. L. Villa. Vetores de transferência molecular contendo a informação para a síntese de pro-insulina humana e seus processos de obtenção (1983)

With S.J. de Souza. Isolated protein having molecular weight of from about 55 kilodaltons to about 65 kilodaltons (SDs-page) which binds to prion protein. US 5679530 (1997)

With A.J.G. Simpson & E. Dias Neto. Method for determining nucleotide sequences using arbitrary primers and low stringency. US  0155438 (2002)

With A.J. G. Simpson & E. Dias Neto. Métodos para determinar sistemas abertos para leitura do genoma de um organismo, para determinar que uma seqüência de nucleotídeos conhecida a partir de um genoma de um organismo corresponde a uma sequência de nucleotídeos a partir de um sistema aberto para leitura, para preparar uma molécula de ácido nuclêico contíguo a partir de um genoma de um organismo, e para sequenciar todo ou parte de um genoma de um organismo US 0919671620 (2002) PI9900267-1 A2 (2002)