Illinois Medicine

in memoriam FACULTY Lorris M. Bowers '53, MD '55, of Peoria, Ill., died on Feb. 28. A physi- cian, teacher and steadfast Illini football fan, Bowers was the first flight surgeon in the U.S. Air Force to exceed the speed of sound. He was inducted into the MACH Buster's Club for his achievement. Board-certified, he came to Peoria in 1963, and his private urology practice spanned almost four decades, until his retire- ment in 2002. He served on the staff of OSF Saint Francis Medical Center, Methodist Medical Center of Illinois and Proc- tor Hospital. The 1972 recipient of the Edwin L. Thirlby Award of the American Urological Association, Bowers was proudest of his pioneering work on the role of vascular disease in erectile defi- ciency. He also authored path-breaking articles on urinary stone disease. He was a faculty member of the College of Medicine in Peoria from 1975 to 2012 and held leadership positions in many professional associations. One of the founding members of the Midwest Urological Group, he served as an Illinois State Medical Society delegate and several organizations as presi- dent—the Peoria Medical Society, the Midstate Foundation for Medical Care Inc. and the medical staff of Methodist Hospital. Later in life, he owned and operated Collingwood Farm in Brimfield, Ill., enjoying a return to the farm life he had experienced as a child. Recently inducted into the Sons of the American Revolution, Bowers led an active life, enjoying skiing, scuba diving, camping, traveling and dancing. Kate & Michael Bárány THE COLLEGE OF MEDICINE LOST TWO OF ITS MOST DISTINGUISHED FACULTY MEMBERS with the passing of Kate Bárány on June 13, 2011, and Michael Bárány on July 24, 2011. Joining the college faculty in Chi- cago in 1974—Kate in physiology and biophysics and Michael in biochemis- try—the Báránys contributed much in their 37 years with the university. Michael was recognized as a University Scholar and a distinguished faculty member, while Kate was a renowned educator, whose career as a scientist and supporter of gender equality led to recognition as the Uni- versity of Illinois at Chicago's Woman of the Year in 1996. She was instrumen- tal in establishing the UIC Children's Center and fought for flexible tenure, career guidance for women in science, female-friendly facilities and equal pen- sions for men and women. Born in Békéscsaba, Hungary, Kate was an accomplished young pianist who had hoped for a concert career. In 1944, she was deported to the Auschwitz concentration camp and, after its liberation, spent eight months in a Soviet prisoner camp in Belorussia. Kate studied physics, physical chemistry and mathematics at the Eötvös University in Budapest, obtaining an MSc in physics. In 1949, she married Michael Bárány, a medical student and fellow Holocaust survivor who would become her lifelong collaborator. After fleeing from Hungary in 1957, the couple reached Germany where, in 1959, Kate completed her doctorate in physical chemistry at the Goethe University, Frank- furt am Main. The couple immigrated in 1960 to New York City with their two sons, George and Francis, who are now Hungarian emigres' Kate and Michael Bárány spent 37 years together on the College of Medicine at Chicago faculty. both professors, George in the department of chemistry at the University of Minnesota-Twin Cities and Francis in the department of microbiology and immunology at the Weill Cornell Medical College in New York City. Kate and Michael worked at the then-new Institute for Muscle Disease until its 1974 closing, when they both joined the faculty at the College of Medicine. Kate was active in research and teaching until impaired vision forced her to retire in 1998, and she was named professor emerita. An educator of medical, dental and gradu- ate students, she was the recipient of the Golden Apple for Excellence in Teaching, the Philip Hawley Distin- guished Faculty Award, the Teaching Recognition Program Award and the Urban Health Enrichment Award. An expert on the physiology of muscles and muscle disease, Kate published 82 full papers and 12 book chapters on the physical chemical characterization of proteins, the physiology of muscle contraction and protein phosphorylation. She was a member of the Federation of American Societies for Experimen- tal Biology, the American Physiological Society and the Biophysical Society. Kate and Michael Bárány were invited to write their autobiog- raphy for the "Selected Topics in the History of Biochemistry" (an Elsevier series). Their chapter, titled "Strife and Hope in the Lives of a Scientific Couple," was published in 2000. The couple was married nearly 62 years and, until their respective illnesses, the pair regularly walked to and from work together—and were known around campus as "the professors who held hands." 42 | FALL 2012

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