IN MEMORIAM : JACQUES NUNEZ

Nunez a major contributor to our knowledge of the thyroid gland and the role of thyroid hormone on brain development and one of the founding members of the European Thyroid Association and of the Hormones and Cell Regulation Symposium, died in Washington in February 2018. French, he was born in Tunis (Tunisia) in 1927 in a Jewish family of Italian origin. He began his career as a fundamental organic chemist at the Pasteur Institute, then ,as biochemist, at the College of France, Inserm and finally at the NIH.The first part of his career was devoted to the biosynthesis of thyroid hormone and the control of thyroid cell metabolism.  In particular he discovered reverse T3, characterized the enzymatic systems (thyroperoxidase  ,H2O2 generating system etc.,) involved in the synthesis of thyroid hormones. He also developed the field of the biochemical actions of thyroid hormones. He then began a major research activity on the role of microtubules and microtubule-associated proteins on brain development and on their regulation by thyroid hormones. He described the changes in activity and composition of the microtubule-associated proteins tau and MAP2 during brain development. 
During his stay in Bruxelles in 1982-1984, working with J.P. Brion, they discovered that tau proteins were the molecular component of neurofibrillary tangles, a key brain lesion in Alzheimer’s disease. This major discovery led him later to further findings in brain development and in Alzheimer’s disease.A major, authoritative figure in thyroid and in neurosciences, a forceful debater and organiser.
Nunez will be much regretted.

J E DUMONT , J P BRION   Francon J, Fellous A, Lennon AM, Nunez J: Is thyroxine a regulatory signal for neurotubule assembly during brain development? Nature 1977, 266:188-90. PMID 859595 Mareck A, Fellous A, Francon J, Nunez J: Changes in composition and activity of microtubule-associated proteins during brain development. Nature 1980, 284:353-5. PMID 7360270 Brion JP, Passareiro H, Nunez J, Flament-Durand J: Mise en évidence immunologique de la protéine tau au niveau des lésions de dégénérescence neurofibrillaire de la maladie d'Alzheimer. ArchBiol(Brux) 1985, 95:229-35.