Albert Szent - Györgyi Albert Szent - Györgyi de Nagyrápolt ( ; September 16 , 1893 – October 22 , 1986 ) was a Hungarian physiologist who won the Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine in 1937 . He is credited with discovering vitamin C and the components and reactions of the citric acid cycle . He was also active in the Hungarian Resistance during World War II and entered Hungarian politics after the war . Early life . Szent - Györgyi was born in Budapest , Kingdom of Hungary , Austro - Hungarian Empire , in 1893 . His father , Miklós Szent - Györgyi , was a landowner , born in Marosvásárhely , Transylvania ( today Târgu Mureş , Romania ) , a Calvinist , and could trace his ancestry back to 1608 when Sámuel , a Calvinist predicant , was ennobled . At the time of Szent - Georgyi ' s birth , the ability to trace one ' s ancestry was considered important and created opportunities that otherwise were not available . ( Miklós Szent - Györgyi ' s parents were Imre Szent - Györgyi and Mária Csiky ) . His mother , Jozefina , a Roman Catholic , was a daughter of József Lenhossék and Anna Bossányi . Jozefina was a sister of Mihály Lenhossék ; both of these men were Professors of Anatomy at the Eötvös Loránd University . His family included three generations of scientists . Music was important in the Lenhossék family . His mother Jozefina prepared to become an opera singer and auditioned for Gustav Mahler , then a conductor at the Budapest Opera . He advised her to marry instead , since her voice was not enough . Albert himself was good at the piano , while his brother Pál became a professional violinist . Medical research . Szent - Györgyi began his studies at the Semmelweis University in 1911 , but soon became bored with classes and began research in his uncle ' s anatomy lab . His studies were interrupted in 1914 to serve as an army medic in World War I . In 1916 , disgusted with the war , Szent - Györgyi shot himself in the arm , claimed to be wounded from enemy fire , and was sent home on medical leave . He was then able to finish his medical education and received his MD in 1917 . He married Kornélia Demény , the daughter of the Hungarian Postmaster General that same year . After the war , Szent - Györgyi began his research career in Bratislava . He switched universities several times over the next few years , finally ending up at the University of Groningen , where his work focused on the chemistry of cellular respiration . This work landed him a position as a Rockefeller Foundation fellow at Cambridge University . He received his PhD from Cambridge in 1927 for work on isolating an organic acid , which he then called " hexuronic acid " , from adrenal gland tissue . He accepted a position at the University of Szeged in 1930 . There , Szent - Györgyi and his research fellow Joseph Svirbely found that " hexuronic acid " was actually the thus far unidentified antiscorbutic factor , known as vitamin C . After Walter Norman Haworth had determined the structure of vitamin C , and in honour of its antiscorbutic properties , it was given the formal chemical name of L - ascorbic acid . In some experiments they used paprika as the source for their vitamin C . Also during this time , Szent - Györgyi continued his work on cellular respiration , identifying fumaric acid and other steps in what would become known as the Krebs cycle . In Szeged he also met Zoltán Bay , physicist , who became his personal friend and partner in research on matters of bio - physics . In 1937 , he received the Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine " for his discoveries in connection with the biological combustion process with special reference to vitamin C and the catalysis of fumaric acid " . Albert Szent - Györgyi offered all of his Nobel prize money to Finland in 1940 . ( The Hungarian Volunteers in the Winter War travelled to fight for the Finns after the Soviet invasion of Finland in 1939 . ) In 1938 , he began work on the biophysics of muscle movement . He found that muscles contain actin , which when combined with the protein myosin and the energy source ATP , contract muscle fibers . In 1947 , Szent - Györgyi established the Institute for Muscle Research at the Marine Biological Laboratory in Woods Hole , Massachusetts with financial support from Hungarian businessman Stephen Rath . However , Szent - Györgyi still faced funding difficulties for several years , due to his foreign status and former association with the government of a Communist nation . In 1948 , he received a research position with the National Institutes of Health ( NIH ) in Bethesda , Maryland and began dividing his time between there and Woods Hole . In 1950 , grants from the Armour Meat Company and the American Heart Association allowed him to establish the Institute for Muscle Research . During the 1950s , Szent - Györgyi began using electron microscope s to study muscles at the subunit level . He received the Lasker Award in 1954 . In 1955 , he became a naturalized citizen of the United States . He became a member of the National Academy of Sciences in 1956 . In the late 1950s , Szent - Györgyi developed a research interest in cancer and developed ideas on applying the theories of quantum mechanics to the biochemistry of cancer . The death of Rath , who had acted as the financial administrator of the Institute for Muscle Research , left Szent - Györgyi in a financial mess . Szent - Györgyi refused to submit government grants which required him to provide minute details on exactly how he intended to spend the research dollars and what he expected to find . After Szent - Györgyi commented on his financial hardships in a 1971 newspaper interview , attorney Franklin Salisbury contacted him and later helped him establish a private nonprofit organization , the National Foundation for Cancer Research . Late in life , Szent - Györgyi began to pursue free radical s as a potential cause of cancer . He came to see cancer as being ultimately an electronic problem at the molecular level . In 1974 , reflecting his interests in quantum physics , he proposed the term " syntropy " replace the term " negentropy " . Ralph Moss , a protégé of his in the years he performed his cancer research , wrote a biography entitled : " Free Radical : Albert Szent - Gyorgyi and the Battle over Vitamin C " , ISBN 0 - 913729 - 78 - 7 , ( 1988 ) , Paragon House Publishers , New York . Aspects of this work are an important precursor to what is now dubbed redox signaling . Involvement in politics . As the government of Gyula Gömbös and the associated Hungarian National Defence Association gained control of politics in Hungary , Szent - Györgyi helped his Jewish friends escape from the country . During World War II , he joined the Hungarian resistance movement . Although Hungary was allied with the Axis Powers , the Hungarian prime minister Miklós Kállay sent Szent - Györgyi to Cairo in 1944 under the guise of a scientific lecture to begin secret negotiations with the Allies . The Germans learned of this plot and Adolf Hitler himself issued a warrant for the arrest of Szent - Györgyi . He escaped house arrest and spent 1944 to 1945 as a fugitive from the Gestapo . After the war , Szent - Györgyi was well - recognized as a public figure and there was some speculation that he might become President of Hungary , should the Soviets permit it . Szent - Györgyi established a laboratory at the University of Budapest and became head of the biochemistry department there . He was elected as a member of Parliament and helped re - establish the Academy of Sciences . Dissatisfied with the Communist rule of Hungary , he emigrated to the United States in 1947 . In 1967 , Szent - Györgyi signed a letter declaring his intention to refuse to pay taxes in protest against the U . S . war against Vietnam , and urging other people to also take this stand . Personal life . He married Cornelia Demény , daughter of the Hungarian Postmaster - General , in 1917 . Their daughter , Cornelia Szent - Györgyi , was born in 1918 . He and Cornelia divorced in 1941 . In 1941 , he wed Marta Borbiro Miskolczy . She died of cancer in 1963 . Szent - Györgyi married June Susan Wichterman , the 25 - year - old daughter of Woods Hole biologist Ralph Wichterman , in 1965 . They were divorced in 1968 . He married his fourth wife , Marcia Houston , in 1975 . They adopted a daughter , Lola Von Szent - Györgyi . Death . Szent - Györgyi died in Woods Hole , Massachusetts on October 22 , 1986 . He was Honored with a Google Doodle September 16 , 2011 , 118 years after his birth .