Alexander Lutsyk – A Well-Known Ukrainian Morphologist, Scientist, Talented Teacher to the 70th Anniversary

On May 2, 2024, Professor Alexander Lutsyk – histologist, long-term head of the Histology and Embryology Department (1989–2020), Vice-Rector for International Relations (1997–2000), Vice-Rector for Research (2000–2014) of Danylo Halytsky Lviv National Medical University (LNMU) – celebrates his 70th anniversary. Alexander Lutsyk graduated from the Medical Faculty of Lviv State Medical Institute in 1977 and defended his PhD thesis in 1979. Since then, he has worked at the Histology and Embryology Department of the LNMU in 1980–1988 as Assistant Professor, in 1988–1989 as Associate Professor, in 1989–2020 as Chair and Full Professor, and since 2020, as a Professor of the Department. From 1994 to 1995, during one year of sabbatical leave, he was a Visiting Professor at the Indiana University School of Medicine (USA). The research interests of Dr Lutsyk were directed predominantly towards applying lectins as tools in experimental histology, embryology and pathomorphology. In 1974, he was among the first in Ukraine to use lectins as histochemical dyes to study organ and tissue carbohydrates under normal and various pathological conditions. In 1989, he established a unique lectin histochemistry laboratory at the Histology and Embryology Department, where many interested morphologists underwent training through the next decades, resulting in more than 30 PhD and Dsci dissertations being completed and defended. Professor Lutsyk’s research activities and results were presented in two monographs – “Lectins” (1980) and “Lectins in Histochemistry” (1989), as well as the promotion of the Dsci thesis. Almost simultaneously, Alexander Lutsyk initiated the preparation and publication of “Human Histology”(1992) – the first modern histology and embryology textbook written in Ukrainian. This textbook received the State Award of Ukraine (1994). Since then, for more than 30 years, it has been used by students and lecturers of medicine and dentistry in Ukrainian universities, being five times re-edited (1993, 2003, 2010, 2013, 2015). In 1999, Dr Lutsyk, with co-authors, published the “Atlas of Microanatomy of the Oral Cavity Organs” and, in 2000, he was awarded the Yaroslav Mudryy Prize of the Academy of Sciences of Higher Education of Ukraine. Also, he was among the translators of the International Histological Terminology (editions 1993, 2001, 2010), Langman’s Medical Embryology (2001), Ganong’s Human Physiology (2002), Dorland’s Illustrated Medical Dictionary (editions 2003, 2007), Netter’s Human Anatomy (2004, 2009) into Ukrainian. The above didactic activities were crowned with the publication by the leading Ukrainian histologists under the editorship of Professor Lutsyk and Professor Chaikovskyi’s National textbooks “Histology. Cytology. Embryology” for medical and dental students and professionals. While being Vice-Rector for International Relations, Alexander Lutsyk initiated the organization of English Medium Faculty for International Students at the LNMU (1998). In the position of Vice-Rector for Research, he paid considerable attention to the involvement of the LNMU research staff in international cooperation, publishing the most important data in international peer-reviewed professional journals. Special care was taken upon restoring the historical achievements of LNMU Professor staff, especially against the background of its Austrian period (1784–1918). These activities resulted in the publication of two editions of the book “Professors of Danylo Halytsky Lviv National Medical University” (2006, 2009), large-scale articles in the Encyclopedia of Modern Ukraine (2001–2023), the Encyclopedia of Lviv (2010, 2012), the Encyclopedia of Ivan Franko University in Lviv (2011), papers of Wien University, as well as several articles in scientific journals. Since 2016, Alexander Lutsyk has been the deputy editor of the magazine “Proceedings of the Shevchenko Scientific Society. Medical Sciences,” a member of the editorial board of the journals “Morphologia,” “Lviv Medical Journal/Acta Medica Leopoliensia,” “Lviv Clinical Bulletin.” He has co-authored over 400 publications of different levels, accounting for the Hirsch index in the Scopus database (7) and Google Scholar (13). Under Dr Lutsyk’s guidance, 6 PhD and 2 Dsci dissertations were prepared and conferred. In September 2019, by the decision of the Presidium of the Scientific Society of Anatomists, Histologists, Embryologists, and Topographic Anatomists of Ukraine, Professor Alexander Lutsyk was awarded the highest distinction of this same Society – “The Golden Medal of V.O. Betz.”