[2][3] That work resulted in a better understanding of how beta cells in the pancreatic islets of Langerhans produced and exported insulin, and it steadily propelled Lacy through the academic ranks.
In 1961, Lacy was named the sixth chairman of Pathology at Washington University, having been preceded by Eugene Lindsay Opie, Leo Loeb, Howard McCordock, Robert Alan Moore, and Stanley Hartroft.
[4] The last of those individuals had concentrated his efforts almost exclusively at building a strong research program in the department, and Lacy furthered that process.
[5] Ultimately, Lacy invited Ackerman to join his department; subsequently, the two had a reasonably cordial but somewhat-distant professional relationship for the next decade.
[6] Throughout the 1960s and early 1970s, Lacy collaborated with Walter F. Ballinger, chairperson of Surgery at Washington University, on the experimental technique of beta islet-cell transplantation in animals as a treatment for diabetes mellitus.