http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Insulin
Nicolae Paulescu, a Romanian professor of physiology at the University of Medicine and Pharmacy in Bucharest, was the first to isolate insulin, in 1916, which he called at that time, pancrein, by developing an aqueous pancreatic extract which, when injected into a diabetic dog, proved to have a normalizing effect on blood sugar levels. He had to interrupt his experiments because the World War I and in 1921 he wrote four papers about his work carried out in Bucharest and his tests on a diabetic dog. Later that year, he detailed his work by publishing an extensive whitepaper on the effect of the pancreatic extract injected into a diabetic animal, which he called: "Research on the Role of the Pancreas in Food Assimilation" [36][37].
Only 8 months later, the discoveries he published were copied (or, as some say, confirmed) by doctor Frederick Grant Banting and biochemist John James Rickard Macleod, who were later awarded the Nobel prize for the discovery of insulin in 1923, which Paulescu discovered as early as 1916. By the time Banting also isolated insulin, Paulescu already held a patent for his discovery and he was the first to secure the patent rights for his method of manufacturing pancreine/insulin (April 10, 1922, patent no. 6254 (8322) "Pancreina şi procedeul fabricaţiei ei"/"Pancrein and the process of making it", from the Romanian Ministry of Industry and Trade). Moreover, Banting was very familiar with Paulescu’s work, he even used Paulescu’s “Research on the Role of the Pancreas in Food Assimilation†as reference in the paper that brought him the Nobel [38].
Paulescu Controversy
It is often said that the cause for not being recognised as the true discoverer of insulin is because he expressed antisemitic and anti-masonic views. In 2003, following protests from several Jewish organizations, the inauguration of his bust at the Hôtel-Dieu State Hospital in Paris, scheduled for August 27, was cancelled. Also, the French Minister of Health, stated that all his scientific merit must be nullified because of his "brutal inhumanity" of expressing anti-Jewish views. In 2005, the Executive Board of the International Diabetes Federation decided that "the institute does not be associated with Nicolae Paulescu" because of his anti-semitic views and that "there would be no Paulescu Lecture at World Diabetes Congresses should such a request be receivedâ€, all his other lectures, or related to him, were banned.
He was also the first individual to use insulin to reduce blood sugar in a mammal, carrying out a series of treatments on diabetics animals and recording its efficacy when injected.[39