When I was in Japan working on the amino acid sequence of α-bungarotoxin at the Institute of Protein Research in Osaka 1970/1971, CP 673451 I visited Nobuo’s lab in Sendai, one of the “hot-spots” of snake toxin research at this time.

I stayed in his home and was amazed to find in the bathroom a couple of gel filtration and ion-exchange columns used to fractionate sea snake venom. When discussing our work and particularly manual Edman degradation, we never agreed whether the identification of PTH-amino acids by thin-layer chromatography or by amino acid analysis of the residual peptide is better or not. Today protein chemists may not understand such problems when they rely on their automatic machines. One early morning looking out of the window, I felt to be back in the time of “old Japan”. Nobuo dressed in traditional garments was standing in his garden practizing “kyudo”, the Japanese art of archery. When I asked him what object he is targeting he explained to me that his performance emphasizes on form and etiquette rather than of accuracy. He joked that he would not compete with the medieval warriors, the samurai. Collecting sea

snakes for extracting their venom, Nobuo considered this as the most pleasant part of his research activities. He joined several expeditions such as to the Timor Sea, Australia, New Caledonia, Fiji, Vanuatu, Tonga, Samoa, Niue etc. The late André Ménez, who has been in Nubuo’s lab in 1974 and 1979/1980, participated in several of these journeys. During a collecting trip to Niue André was bitten by a sea this website snake. Of course, no antivenom was available. However, André survived, either the snake hadn’t injected venom or it was rather weak. But Nobuo who kept watching the peacefully sleeping victim Pyruvate dehydrogenase all night, mentioned next morning that he most feared “that I have to kiss you” meaning mouth-to-mouth resuscitation in case of respiratory arrest. André described it as a personally great

experience to work with Nobuo when he showed him how to milk a snake and how to analyze the venom. Nobuo’s work was honoured by an award of the Chemical Society of Japan (1970), the “Ordre des Palmes Académique” of France (1980), by the Redi-Award of the International Society on Toxinology (1984), the “Medal with Purple Ribbon” and the “Order of the Sacred Treasure, Gold and Silver Star” from his government. It was always a pleasant experience meeting Nobuo and his wife Nakako. With my other Japanese friends they stimulated my affection for Japan I also shared with André. We were able to make jokes about typical Japanese behavior and strange traditions as well as exchanging critical views about our western lifestyle. Since both of us had experienced western and eastern life as well, we regarded the cultural background of each of us with deep respect. The International Society on Toxinology lost one of its pioneers in toxin research, I will miss a great mentor and friend.