 Between 1953 and 1957 he worked as a researcher with Professor Traian Săvulescu at the Department of Phytopathology of the Agricultural Research Institute, Bucharest, Romania, where he began studying smut fungi.However – as he always wanted to be a physician – in 1957 he left Bucharest for the Faculty of Medicine, Tîrgu-Mureş (Marosvásárhely), Romania, where he obtained his MD in 1961.From 1961 until 1964 he worked as a general practitioner in Odorhei (Székelyudvarhely), then, until 1969, he worked as a balneologist in Borszék but continued studying and collecting smut fungi.