LABORATORY AND BRANCH RESEARCH REVIEWS 77Laboratory of Cellular
Pharmacology, NIMH
In mid-1954 the last laboratory to be created in the NIMH-NINDB
intramural basic research program was the Laboratory of Cellular
Pharmacology. Biochemist Giulio L. Cantoni was chief of this new
laboratory that investigated “the enzymatic and other biochemical
mechanisms of drug and hormone synthesis and their action in the body.”^1
Giulio L. Cantoni, M.D.
Courtesy of the National Institute
of Mental Health
The laboratory was not initially divided into sections due to its small
size, and all staff instead focused on three overlapping areas of investi
gation: 1) biological methylation; 2) comparative biochemistry; and
3) the interrelationship between amino acid metabolism and the tricar
boxylic acid cycle.^2
The biological methylation area focused on the central role played by
the amino acid methionine in enzymatic transmethylation reactions,
specifically, the mechanism of reaction of the methionine-activating
enzyme, the chemistry and enzymology of S-adenosylmethionine and the