David Lichtstein

Life and career

Lichtstein was born in Łódź, Poland in 1949. He immigrated to Israel with his family in 1957. As a student at the Hebrew University, he completed a B.Sc. in Physiology and Zoology in 1970, followed by an M.Sc. in Physiology in 1972 and a Ph.D. in Physiology in 1977. Lichtstein chose medical sciences as a career because of the opportunity to combine science and contributing to human welfare. His Ph.D research, under the supervision of Prof. J. Dobkin and Prof. J. Magnes, concentrated on metabolic changes in the brain under normal and pathological circumstances. His Postdoctoral research (1977–1980) on opioid peptides was held at the Roche Institute of Molecular Biology, Nutley, New Jersey.

In 1980, when he returned to Israel, Lichtstein joined the Department of Physiology of the Hebrew University-Hadassah Medical School as a lecturer; he was promoted to Associate Professor in 1988 and to Professor in 1994. He was a visiting scientist at the National Institute of Child Health and Human Development (1985–1986) and the Eye Institute (1997–1998) at the National Institutes of Health in Maryland, and a visiting professor at the Toledo School of Medicine in Ohio (2007).

Lichtstein served as the President of the Israel Society for Physiology and Pharmacology from 1996 to 1999. In addition, Lichtstein has held many roles at The Hebrew University and its Faculty of Medicine, including Chairman of the Neurobiology Teaching Division (1983–1986), Chairman of the Department of Physiology (1992–1996), Chairman of the Institute for Medical Sciences (1999–2002) and Chairman of the Institute For Medical Research, Israel-Canada (2008–2012). In 2013, Lichtstein was elected to serve as the Dean of the Faculty of Medicine at the Hebrew University.

Lichtstein is married to Esther and they have three children, Ehud, Tamar and Gidon.

Research

Lichtstein's research has implications for the fundamental understanding of body functions, as well as for pathological states such as heart failure, hypertension and neurological and psychiatric diseases.

His research focuses on understanding the regulation of ion transport across the plasma membrane of eukaryotic cells. Specifically, Lichtstein examines the main transport system for sodium and potassium, the sodium-potassium-ATPase, and its regulation by cardiac steroids. His work led to the discovery of specific steroids, released from the adrenal gland, which have crucial roles in the regulation of cell viability, heart contractility, blood pressure and brain function. Identifying and understanding these steroids may then be very significant in the development of medicines to many diseases and pathological states, and Lichtstein's lab is currently conducting various experiments to examine such potential effects.

Lichtstein has published more than 100 scientific papers in scholarly journals and books. In addition, Lichtstein serves as an acting reviewer for many journals. More than 30 graduate students from his laboratory are engaged today in research and teaching in various institutions in Israel and abroad.