Enrique Mapua Ostrea, Jr.

Is a Filipino physician noted for his pediatric research and

medicine studies. Dr. Enrique Ostrea is a neonatologist in
Detroit, Michigan and is affiliated with multiple hospitals in the
area, including Children's Hospital of Michigan and DMC
Harper University Hospital. He received his medical degree
from University of the Philippines College of Medicine and has
been in practice for more than 20 years. Neonatal-Perinatal
Medicine/Neonatologists are pediatricians who treat
newborns, especially those born prematurely.

The use of meconium in the testing the mother’s abuse of

drugs during the course of pregnancy is pioneered by Dr.
Enrique “Buddy” Ostrea, a Filipino medical doctor known for
his researches in pediatrics. He studied medicine in the University if the Philippines specializing
Pathology and Pediatrics where he graduated cum laude in 1965. He had chosen pediatrics
because he wants to study not just the illnesses of infants and children but also their
development.

He learned that it is not enough to see only 10 cases of illness, but it is also important to read
more about it to better understand everything about that disease. Sometimes, there is a kid there
back and forth because of his diabetic insipidus disease. He noted that this kid’s serum potassium
which is not often the condition of a diabetic insipidus. She studied well by reading the child's
case, until she discovered that the symptoms seen in the child were the same as Barrter's
syndrome. She informed her to the child's doctor and recommended that she undergo the serum
rennin test (the serum rennin is a hormone that comes from kidney or kidney). Inclusive hospital
(Peter Bent Brigham Hospital) and expert in Rennin Dr. John Merrill, and he proved that Dr.'s
findings were correct. The renny level of the kidney and Banter's syndrome is very high in
children's illness and not diabetes insipidus. This opened the way for Dr. Buddy will get fellowship
/ scholarship to Neonatology at John Hopkins Hospital in Baltimore, Maryland.

He contribute the following:

The Meconium Drug Testing

He designed the Mectest kit that introduced the use of Meconium to "Drug Test" a person who
was considered one of the best and accurate methods of drug testing. He was honored to be the
Most Outstanding Physician in Medicine in the Midwest United States in 1991; Best Doctor in
America in 1994 and Philippine Pediatric Society Testimonial of Recognition in 1995. Meconium
is the earliest stool of a mammalian infant. Unlike later feces, meconium is composed of materials
ingested during the time the infant spends in the uterus: intestinal epithelial cells, lanugo, mucus,
amniotic fluid, bile, and water.

He also discover the method for detecting maternally transferred drug metabolites in newborn
infants by detecting drug metabolites from the meconium of a newborn infant. His method
involves separation of the drug metabolites from meconium in solution and then assaying the
solution for the presence of the drug metabolites. The method is particularly useful for detection
of cocaine, morphine and cannabinoids; however, any drug metabolite in the infant meconium
can be tested. Conventional assay methods are used for the drug metabolites in the solutions
derived from the meconium. The method provides for early detection of drug presence in infants
which contribute to infant illness.

Meconium drug testing can detect maternal drug use during the last 4 to 5 months of pregnancy.
A negative result does not exclude the possibility that a mother used drugs during pregnancy.
Detection of drug use depends on the quantity and quality of the specimen tested as well as the
pattern and frequency of drug(s) used by the mother. Although not likely, drugs administered
during labor and delivery may be detected in meconium. Interpretive questions should be
directed to the laboratory. The concentration at which the screening test can detect a drug or
metabolite varies within a drug class. The concentration value must be greater than or equal to
the cutoff to be reported as positive.

oday, the meconium drug testing formula that Dr. Ostrea discovered and developed is widely
used in hospitals and pharmaceutical industries, but did he receive large amount of money for
it? It is sad to say that he is not profiting at all from his invention, which is the product of his 10-
year-long research on meconium (infant’s first stool) and mothers who take drugs during
pregnancy.

“Many people may think that I am now a rich man because of my patented drug testing,” he told
a motley crowd who attended his recent lecture at the Philippine American Community Center
of Michigan (PACCM) in Southfield. “The truth is that I am not rich because I’m not making any
money from it.”

He had secured a patent for his very useful invention, but the infringement on his patent was
widespread and rampant. If he goes after the violators, he would be caught up in a gargantuan
legal tangle that would require much of his time and resources. Thus, he cancelled his plan to
fight for his rights in court.

Did he try to find out how much money the people illegally using his invention are raking in? He
said, “No, I did not because I do not want to know how much I’m missing.” This indicates that for
Doctor Ostrea, whose father hails from Balaoan, La Union, money is not everything. But he is
happy in the thought that the product of his painstaking research for 10 long years at Wayne
State University has become a big boost to the efforts to improve healthcare of people all over
the world.

Lillian Formalejo Patena

Lilian Pateña is a Filipino scientist known for discovering the

seedless lime and seedless pomelo breeds and discovering the
micropropagation that has established the banana industry in
the Philippines. She is also the inventor of leaf-bud cutting on
cassava cultivation. She was honored as One of The Outstanding
Women in the Nation's Service (TOWNS) in 1998, Women of
Distinction for Science and Technology in 1995 and Outstanding
Young Scientist in 1990. Micropropagation is the practice of
rapidly multiplying stock plant material to produce a large
number of progeny plants, using modern plant tissue culture
methods. Micropropagation is used to multiply plants such as
those that have been genetically modified or bred through
conventional plant breeding methods.
September 16, 1953 when Lilian Formalejo Pateña was born in Ibaan, Batangas to Teodoro and
Crisanta Pateña. Her mother loves orchids, while her grandfather owns rice fields and coconut
fields. The coconut extract from his grandfather's coconut is seen by Lilian as his mother uses as
a garden of orchids. Their yard was always full of flowers.

Lilian was Valedictorian when Elementary School in Ibaan Central School (1966) and Valedictorian
still finished High School in St. Louis. James Academy (1970). Her uncle Felimon Javier supported
her other expenses at the University of the Philippines in Los Baños, where she graduated from
Bachelor of Science in Sugar Technology (combined Chemistry and Sugar Engineering). She is top
thirteen (13) from 223 students who graduated from college.

Contributions:

Tissue Culture and the Seedless Fruits

Tissue culture is a way of producing numerous disease-free planting materials in the laboratory
for mass production in the fields. Different plant parts are extracted from parent plants and
grown under aseptic and controlled environment. She chose to work at a university where she
mastered the tissue culture of plants. Lilian's first success was the discovery of Dr. Ramon Barba
which is a tissue culture they use in lime and grapefruit as they find it can also be used in potatoes,
orchids, rattan and other plants. Their study was published in the Philippine Journal of Crop
Science and selected the best paper of the Crop Science Society of the Philippines (CSSP) in 1978.
Not only in the Philippines have identified their findings, even in Hawaii, Guam and in Japan and
China. In this study recorded the culture of endosperm in order to produce a fruit without seeds
such as lime and grapefruit.

Leaf-Bud Cutting Technique

Lilian's subsequent success was his Master's Thesis
about the rapid and massive cassava extraction using
leaf-bud cutting technique. With this technique, it can
produce 4 million plants from just one parent plant for
one year. This is done by cutting leaf sprout and periodic
spraying so that it can quickly be seared. The root will be
removed and transferred to the ground if it is long
enough. In this way, the production of cassava root
increases and the sugar cane is rapidly increasing.

Micropropogation Technique
Lilian further expanded her research on plants as she studied various types of bananas such as:
Lakatan, Bungulan and Saba, using micropropagation technique. Her study was published in The
Philippine Agriculturist in 1989. It opened the minds of private sectors to build laboratories for
small bananas farmers and even big corporations. It spread to Malaysia, Indonesia, Thailand and
throughout the Philippines that gave a superior type of banana. This made the Saba, a type of
banana known as the main food especially in the countryside. The Philippines was also recognized
as one of the leading exporters of quality bananas. Liian has done so many researches on various
plants such as potato, onion and ginger. Everything is all for beauty and rapid growth.

Virus-free Garlic
The Philippines will revive its apparently demised garlic industry as the Institute of Plant
Breeding (IPB) comes up with “mass micropropagation” and “tissue culture” of virus-free garlic
planting materials that can boost garlic production, one of the researcher of this experiement is
Lilian Patena.