The history of his life-work is the history of the epidemiological-clinical bacteriology of his epoch at the same time.

Dr. Béla Lányi finished his academic studies at the Medical University of Budapest, in 1951. Following the four-month work in the clinical laboratory of the County Hospital in Székesfehérvár, he began his career at the Department of Bacteriology in the National Institute of Public Health where he worked for 45 years and acted as the Head of the Department since 1984.

From 1953, he gradually developed the production of immune sera for the serological diagnostics of Salmonella, Shigella and E. coli bacteria and organized the up to date sera and diagnostics producing laboratory to supply the KÖJÁL/ÁNTSZ (Station of Public Health and Epidemiology/National Public Health and Medical Officer Service) laboratory network. From the start, his duties included the improvement and quality control of culture media produced for the KÖJÁL/ÁNTSZ laboratory network, the control of trade media, diagnostic antimicrobial disks and other diagnostic products, and also the microbiological standard evaluation of antibiotics.

He was the Founding Head of the Hungarian National Collection of Medical Bacteria (HNCMB) (1962) that he made internationally recognized.

With his unswerving efforts, he created the conditions of external and internal quality control for bacteriological laboratories and elaborated its efficient control system. For the KÖJÁL/ÁNTSZ laboratories (from 1960), he organized the examination and evaluation of unknown test materials (collaborative studies) and the local surveys combined with the processing of test materials from 1982. As the Chair of Microbiological Expert Committee, he extended the advisory and control activities to the medical bacteriological laboratories operating in the preventive-curative and university institutes, from 1984.

In the seventies, he had introduced the unified, IT data supply and evaluation system for the epidemiological bacteriological laboratories. With the regular evaluation of the annual work of KÖJÁL/ÁNTSZ laboratories (so-called White Note-books, he made a substantial contribution to the improvement of the level of the diagnostic work.

As the result of his editorial activity, the Methodological Guide (1969) summing up the national methodological procedures based on standard methods and the medical-bacteriological diagnostic handbook with the title of Epidemiological and Clinical-bacteriological Methodology Guide (1980) were published.

He had undying merits in medical education and further education, and in the field of training for hygienists.

He achieved important accomplishments in the research of serological and biochemical features of Pseudomonas aeruginosa and related bacteria and in the studies of their public health significance. One of his most important works was the Pseudomonas antigen scheme accepted also by the National Committee of Nomenclature. He identified the antigen relationship of the members of P. aeruginosa and Enterobacteriaceae family. He studied the pathogenicity of sero-group E. coli O124, the aetiology of infant and childhood gastroenteritis, the occurrence of Salmonella infections, and the serology and pathogenicity of bacteria belonging to Proteus group. He worked out new, practical procedures for the identification of bacteria and for the determination of their antibiotic sensitivity.

About 300 references were made to his 94 publications and chapters.

He developed significant, international scientific collaboration for the study of the immune chemical structure of P. aeruginosa O antigens and for the determination of the antigen structure of a facultative pathogen Pseudomonas group.

In 1969, with his dissertation Pseudomonas aeruginosa he became the holder of candidates degree in medical science. For his thesis with the title of Serological, hygienic and clinical characterization of Pseudomonas aeruginosa, he obtained the Academic Degree in Medicine of the Hungarian Academy of Sciences in 1980.

He was the Editor (from 1971) and Editor-in Chief (from 1976) of the journal Acta Microbiologica.

He was the Editor-in Chief of Alps-Adriatic Microbiology Journal (from 1992).

He was the leading member in the Hungarian Society of Microbiology, Chair of the Bacteriological Section, President of the Microbiological Expert Committee governing the inspection of medical-microbiological laboratories, Examiner of the National Qualification Committee, member of the Public Health Department of University of Postgraduate Medical Education, member of the Committee for Microbiology, Epidemiology and Vaccine, member of the Board of Infectious and Tropical Diseases, member in the Working Committee for the Microbiological Code Review and Cross-checking of Charges of the Ministry of Welfare, member of the Committee of General Microbiology of the Hungarian Academy of Sciences, member of the Board for the Hungarian National Foundation of Genital-urinary Medicine, leading member of the Alps-Adriatic Microbiological Group, member of the Clinical-Epidemiological Committee in the National Institute of Traumatology, and the representative of the Hungarian Society of Microbiology in the International Committee for Bacteriological Nomenclature and Taxonomy.

He had a considerable work in the institution of the Board of Microbiology and was its President until his death.

                                                                                                  Dr. Mária Herpay, Head of Department

Publications of Dr. Béla Lányi