Laudatio: professor Igor Buchwalow on the occasion of his 70th birthday (Gerhard Domagk Institute for Pathology, University of Münster, Germany).

This year, Professor Dr. habil. Igor Buchwalow — known to his peers for his charisma, creativity, holistic interests and his special attitude to people and scientific problems — celebrates his 70th birthday. He was born on June 26, 1938 in Moscow, Russia. In 1965, he graduated from the Biological Faculty of the Lomonosov State University of Moscow. Since completing his Ph. D. studies in cytology at the Institute of Developmental Biology of the Academy of Sciences of the USSR in 1968, he has worked at the Moscow Cancer Research Center of the Academy of Medical Sciences of the USSR, where he earned his second doctoral degree in histology and embryology in 1983. In 1987 he received the title of professor. Igor Buchwalow founded a scientific school in research in the former USSR based on applications of enzymoand immunohistochemistry in experimental biology and pathology. His laboratory of Electron Microscopy and Histochemistry in the All-Union Institute of Obstetrics and Gynaecology and later in the All-Union Research Institute of Biotechnology in Moscow became a point of attraction for young doctoral students not only from the Russian Federation but also from other Republics of the former USSR — Ukraine, Belarus, Tadzhikistan and Turkmenistan. Some of his doctoral students themselves later became professors in their own right. Until as recently as 1994, as a guest professor of the State University of Moscow, he tutored students in histochemistry at the Biological Faculty. During his time at this institution he translated principal laboratory manuals and textbooks on histochemistry written by leading European histochemists — Günter Geyer, Hans Luppa, Reinhart Gossrau, Zdenek Lojda and Theodor Schiebler — into Russian. These books remain an important source for young histochemists. Professor Buchwalow’s charismatic personality also rightfully contributed towards him becoming one of the leading Russian histochemists. He was a member of Scientific Councils in the Russian Academy of Medical Sciences and he was the President of the Russian Histochemical Society from 1991 to 1995. It is important also to emphasize the contribution of Igor Buchwalow in the organization of a number of international and bilateral Russian—German conferences on histochemistry, all of which were very successful. During the 1970s and 1980s, many of his scientific activities arose from collaboration with research centers in Germany. Of great importance are the results of his cooperation with Eberhard Unger from the Institute of Molecular Biotechnology in Jena. One of the principal outcomes of this activity was their study «Enzyme activity of nuclear ribonucleoproteins» published in Experimental Cell Research in 1977. This study remains a key work in the field. Many of his further works completed in collaboration with German colleagues were published in leading international scientific journals including Acta Histochemica, Histochemistry and Cell Biology, Biochemical and Biophysical Research Communications, Nitric Oxide, FASEB Journal, Modern Pathology, Laboratory Investigation, Acta Neuropathologica, Kidney International, Cardiovascular Research and others. His studies of NO-synthase expression in the media of blood vessels resulted in the elucidation of an alternative mechanism by which local NO-synthase expression in smooth muscle cells can modulate vascular functions in an endotheliumindependent manner (Buchwalow et al., 2002, 2004). He also showed that, in contrast to the commonly accepted view, NO-synthase is not restricted to the sarcolemma in skeletal muscles (Buchwalow et al., 2005a) and that muscle fibers of patients with muscular dystrophy retain all three NO-synthase isoforms with an up-regulation of the inducible and endothelial isoforms (Buchwalow et al., 2006; Punkr et al., 2006). His innovations in multiple immunolabeling for simultaneous detection of two and more tissue antigens (Buchwalow et al., 2055b) emerged as an important tool in identification of progenitor or adult stem cells (Bocker et al., 2002; Boecker et al., 2002). Since 1994, Igor Buchwalow has worked in Germany, first at the University of Ulm as a guest professor of the Max 2 0 0 8 Ö È Ò Î Ë Î Ã È ß Ò î ì 50, 1 10