István Madarász

After graduating, between 1952 and 1958 he was a postgraduate student and then an assistant professor at the Institute of Physiology of the Medical University of Pécs (POTE), under the leadership of Professor Lissák. His topic was the development of conditioned reflexes in animals, their regularities, and their connections with behavior and higher nervous activity. He also defended his PhD thesis on this topic, entitled Gender-specific forms of adaptation and conditioned reflexes.

Between 1958 and 1972, he was an assistant professor and then an assistant professor at the Institute of Physiology of the Medical University of Szeged (SZOTE). Here, he studied the effects of ligation of the cervical lymphatic vessels and blockade of the lymph nodes on brain function, and he researched the excitation and inhibition processes of the nervous system (GABA). Later, he was among the first in Hungary to apply the method of visual and auditory cortical evoked potentials in the study of sensory functions. The study of the hippocampus was also an important topic for him. More than 40 of his publications on the above topics were published in Hungarian and foreign journals.

In 1964-1965, he conducted research at the Institute of Physiology in Parma on a one-year scholarship. In 1966, he conducted research in Basel for 3 months, also on a scholarship.

From 1972 until his retirement, he was a senior research fellow at the Cybernetics Laboratory of József Attila University (JATE) led by László Kalmár. Here – in addition to his educational activities – he was the initiator of the application of computer science and cybernetics methods in medicine and biology. He developed independent methods with an interdisciplinary approach, which he also used in his own research, when he examined the role of fatigue, attention, motivation, and risk-taking in athletes' performance, in collaboration with the Research Institute of the College of Physical Education and several institutes of SZOTE. The tests developed for this purpose were also used in practice to measure athletes' performance.

In 1972, he gave a lecture at the first World Congress of Cybernetics in Porto Alegre (Brazil), in 1984 he represented Hungary at the 4th World Conference on Olympic Sports Sciences in Eugene, Oregon, and also participated in the Olympic Science Congress in Los Angeles.

He was the founding chairman of the Medical Biology Department of the National Institute of Physical Education and Sports Sciences (NJSZT) when it was founded in 1970, and later a member of its board. He also worked in the Csongrád County management of the National Institute of Physical Education and Sports Sciences. He was a member of two committees of the Physical Education and Sports Science Council, the Computer Technology Committee of the Ministry of Health, and the International Federation of Information Processing (IFIP).

Award: Badge for Excellent Work (Minister of Culture, 1985).