M.F. Shuba (1928-2007)

The Department of neuro-muscular physiology (DNMP) was established in 1969. Its organizer and the only chair until 2007 was the founder of the Ukrainian national school for the study of smooth muscles, professor, full member of the National Academy of Sciences of Ukraine (since 1990) Michael F. Shuba (1928-2007). Smooth muscles represent one of the three types of muscular tissue of higher organisms, which are known to be divided into skeletal, cardiac and smooth. The latter forms the contractile apparatus of the walls of all internal hollow organs - vessels, stomach, intestine, bladder, uterus. At the time of the establishment of the Department, the studies on cardiac and skeletal muscles were already quite advanced, while understanding of smooth muscle functions were still at the stage of development. The main directions of research of the Department became:

• elucidation of ionic mechanisms of electrogenesis and contraction of various types of smooth muscles;
• identification of intracellular signaling pathways involved in excitation-contraction coupling in smooth muscle;
• establishment of the neurotransmitter nature of excitation-inhibition and contraction-relaxation of various types of smooth muscle.

Under Prof. M.F. Shuba's lead the Department has become an internationally recognized center for the study of smooth muscle, in which discoveries of world significance were made, among which:

• the establishment of the electrical connection between the individual smooth muscle cells, enabling the entire smooth muscle tissue to function as uninterrupted electrical syncytium ( see relevant publications ►);

• the discovery of polypeptide component from bee venom, apamine, as a potent and reversible modulator of neuromuscular synaptic transmission (inhibition) in the smooth muscle of gastrointestinal tract ( see relevant publications ►);

• determination of the contributions of extracellular calcium entry and intracellular calcium release in the activation of contraction and basal tone maintenance in different types of smooth musculature ( see relevant publications ►).

Edith Bulbring and a list of her closest colleagues, among which M.F. Shuba is mentioned

High international reputation of the Department in smooth muscle research was greatly further fostered by the work of M.F. Shuba in the laboratory of the world's most renowned scientist in the field of smooth muscle physiology, Prof. Edith Bulbring, in Oxford during 1973-74, and conducting in October 1974 in Kyiv on the basis of Department of extremely representative international symposium, summing all the achievements to that period in the study of smooth muscles.

Students and associated of the Department: Dr. I.A. Vladimirova (1934-2015), Prof. A. Zholos, Dr. D. Gordienko, Dr. V.Y. Ganitkevich (1957-2014), Dr. S. Smirnov, Dr. A.V. Zima, Dr. I.B. Filippov and others, duly took over a high level of smooth muscle research, set up in the Department, and successfully transferred it to new places of their scientific activity.

Its modern appearance the Department acquired in 2007 after merging with the Laboratory of Biophysics of Ion Channels, headed by Prof. Yaroslav M. Shuba, who simultaneously became the new chair of the Department. Merger with the laboratory and inclusion of new personnel led to some reformatting of scientific subjects of the Department towards greater emphasis on directions related to the biophysical properties of ion channels and their role in pathological processes. These directions were:

• Role of ion channels and calcium signaling in malignant transformation and carcinogenesis
• Involvement of thermo- and mechanosensitive ion channels in the functioning of smooth muscles of the male urogenital system
• The influence of diabetes on neuromuscular transmission and excitation-contraction coupling in smooth muscles of the male urogenital system
• Targets of pharmacological action of new openers of ATP-dependent potassium channels (K_ATP) and their selectivity towards tissue-specific K_ATP subtypes of these channels
• Expression, biophysical properties, pharmacology and epigenetic regulation of low-threshold calcium channels in norm and in experimental abscess epilepsy