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Clara M. Ambrus, research professor in the Department of Gynecology-Obstetrics, School of Medicine and Biomedical Sciences, died Feb. 26 in Erie County Medical Center from injuries sustained during a Feb. 11 fire in her Buffalo home. She was 86.
A native of Hungary, Ambrus and her husband, Julian, a retired UB faculty member, met while studying at the University of Budapest. They married in 1944, received their medical degrees in Europe and worked at the Pasteur Institute in Paris before coming to the U.S. in the 1950s.
They settled in Buffalo, becoming researchers at Roswell Park Cancer Institute and joining the UB medical school faculty.
The Ambruses are well known for their humanitarian efforts, as well as for their work in medicine.
During her first year of medical school, Clara Ambrus, who is Christian, bribed guards at camps and ghettos in Nazi-occupied Hungary to release Jewish prisoners, who were hidden and cared for by her family until the end of World War II. Julian Ambrus fought with the Hungarian Resistance during the war and spent time in a Soviet prison camp.
Clara Ambrus received the Courage to Care Award from the Anti-Defamation League in 2008 for her efforts. She also was declared a Foreign Member of the National Academy of Science in Hungary and was named by the pope as a Lady Commander of the Order of the Holy Sepulcher of Jerusalem.
Among her other honors is the George F. Koepf Award from Hauptman-Woodward Medical Research Institute in recognition of her work advancing biomedical research.
“Clara Ambrus was an extraordinary individual who leaves behind a unique legacy that has truly benefited not only her colleagues at the medical school, her patients and the Western New York community, but also the world at large,” says Michael Cain, dean of the UB School of Medicine and Biomedical Sciences.
“We deeply mourn her passing.”
Her survivors include her husband and a son, Julian Ambrus Jr., associate professor of medicine at UB.
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