Feodor Lynen

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Feodor Felix Konrad Lynen, ca.1965

Feodor Felix Konrad Lynen (born April 6, 1911 in Munich ; † August 6, 1979 there ) was a German biochemist and Nobel Prize winner .

Life

Feodor Lynen was the son of the full professor of mechanical engineering Wilhelm Lynen and his wife Frieda geb. Prym and attended the Luitpold-Gymnasium in Munich. Between 1930 and 1934 Lynen studied chemistry at the Ludwig Maximilians University in Munich , after completing his doctorate in the field of biochemistry from Nobel Prize winner Heinrich Wieland from 1937 to 1942 as a scholarship holder of the Notgemeinschaft der Deutschen Wissenschaft in the chemical laboratory of the Bavarian Academy of Sciences and habilitation himself in 1941. Since 1942 as a lecturer department head for biochemistry at the State Chemical Laboratory of the University of Munich, he became associate professor in 1947 and full professor in 1953. Also in 1953 he was elected a full member of the Bavarian Academy of Sciences.

In 1954 Lynen became director of the Institute for Cell Chemistry at what was then the German Research Institute for Psychiatry . This institute for cell chemistry was converted into the independent Max Planck Institute for Cell Chemistry (Munich) in 1956 , of which Lynen was appointed director. In the following year Lynen took over the professorship for biochemistry at the University of Munich. In 1959 he was elected a member of the Leopoldina , in 1962 in the American Academy of Arts and Sciences and the National Academy of Sciences , in 1966 in the American Philosophical Society and in 1976 in the Academy of Sciences in Göttingen . In 1975 he became a foreign member of the Royal Society and in 1976 he became an Honorary Fellow of the Royal Society of Edinburgh .

The MPI for Cell Chemistry was merged into the newly founded Max Planck Institute for Biochemistry in 1972 .

From 1972 until his retirement in 1979 Lynen was Director of the Department of Enzyme Chemistry and Metabolism, and from 1974 to 1976 "Managing Director" of the Max Planck Institute for Biochemistry in Martinsried near Munich. As one of the most important German biochemists of the 20th century, Lynen worked on the phosphate cycle and the Pasteur effect , but above all on the mechanism and regulation of cholesterol and fatty acid metabolism. In 1951 he succeeded in isolating activated acetic acid ( acetyl coenzyme A ) from yeast cells, in 1958 he identified isopentenyl pyrophosphate as a building block of terpenes and cholesterol. With the isolation of the "activated acetic acid" he provided the basis for clinical research into lipid metabolism disorders, for example in diabetes mellitus or the development of arteriosclerosis . For his work on the mechanism and regulation of cholesterol and fatty acid metabolism, Lynen received the Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine in 1964 together with Konrad Bloch .

Feodor Lynen was married to Eva Wieland, the daughter of his doctoral supervisor Heinrich Wieland . The marriage resulted in five children, of whom the eldest daughter also became a chemist. Lynen is buried in the cemetery of the St. Peter and Paul branch church in the Starnberg district of Rieden .

The Feodor-Lynen-Gymnasium in Planegg was named after him in 1980 . Feodor-Lynen-Strasse is in Hanover near the Medical University , in Munich since 1996 in the Großhadern district and in Planegg. In Starnberg, where he lived for many years, there is a Feodor-Lynen-Steig. The Feodor Lynen Research Fellowship of the Alexander von Humboldt Foundation , of which he was President from 1975 to 1979 , was also named after him . A lecture hall at the Faculty of Chemistry and Pharmacy at the University of Munich also bears his name.

Lynens grave at Gut Rieden

Awards (excerpt)

Fonts (selection)

  • About chemical blueprints for living things. Munich 1966.
  • with Otto Wieland and H. Mehnert: Biochemistry and Clinic of Insulin Deficiency. Stuttgart 1971.
  • Life, Luck and Logic in Biochemical Research. 1969; also in: Perspectives in Biology and Medicine. Volume 12, 1972, pp. 204-218.

literature

  • Lothar Jaenicke :  Lynen, Feodor. In: New German Biography (NDB). Volume 15, Duncker & Humblot, Berlin 1987, ISBN 3-428-00196-6 , pp. 588-590 ( digitized version ).
  • Heike Will: "Be naive and do an experiment." Feodor Lynen: Biography of the Munich biochemist and Nobel Prize winner. Wiley-VCH, Weinheim 2011, ISBN 978-3-527-32893-2 .
  • Kaiser Wilhelm / Max Planck Institute for Biochemistry (Max Planck Institute for Biochemistry) , in: Eckart Henning , Marion Kazemi : Handbook on the history of the institute of the Kaiser Wilhelm / Max Planck Society for the Advancement of Science 1911–2011 - Daten und Quellen , Berlin 2016, 2 volumes, volume 1: Institutes and research centers A – L ( online, PDF, 75 MB ), pages 187–224 (Chronology of the MPI for Biochemistry, where Lynen worked)
  • Max Planck Institute for Cell Chemistry in: Eckart Henning, Marion Kazemi: Handbook on the history of the institute of the Kaiser Wilhelm / Max Planck Society for the Advancement of Science 1911–2011 - data and sources , Berlin 2016, 2 volumes, volume 2: Institutes and research centers M – Z ( online, PDF 75 MB ) Pages 1693–1696 (Chronology of the MPI for Cell Chemistry, which was set up for Lynen).

Web links

Commons : Feodor Lynen  - collection of pictures, videos and audio files

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Member entry of Feodor Lynen (with picture) at the Bavarian Academy of Sciences , accessed on February 10, 2016.
  2. ↑ Yearbook of the Max Planck Society for the Advancement of Science eV 1969 , published by the General Administration of the Max Planck Society for the Advancement of Science eV, Munich 1969, p. 46.
  3. ↑ Member entry of Feodor Lynen (with picture) at the German Academy of Natural Scientists Leopoldina , accessed on February 10, 2016.
  4. ^ Member History: Feodor Lynen. American Philosophical Society, accessed November 23, 2018 .
  5. ^ German biography: Lynen, Feodor .
  6. ^ Fellows Directory. Biographical Index: Former RSE Fellows 1783–2002. (PDF file) Royal Society of Edinburgh, accessed January 4, 2020 .
  7. ^ Heinrich Wieland. The Nobel Prize in Chemistry 1927. Nobel Foundation, accessed January 4, 2010 .
  8. ↑ Feodor Lynen. The Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine 1964. Biography. Nobel Foundation, accessed January 4, 2010 .
  9. ↑ Brochure "Feodor-Lynen-Gymnasium Planegg on July 6, 1981"
  10. ^ Peter Hans Hofschneider: Feodor Lynen. Feodor-Lynen-Gymnasium, archived from the original on January 8, 2014 ; Retrieved June 13, 2011 .
  11. ↑ strassenkatalog.de: Feodor-Lynen-Str.
  12. ^ Feodor-Lynen-Strasse. In: muenchen.de. Retrieved June 12, 2013 .
  13. ^ Wilhelm Normann Medal ( memento of November 30, 2010 in the Internet Archive ), website of the German Society for Fat Science, accessed on January 9, 2013.
personal data
SURNAME Lynen, Feodor
ALTERNATIVE NAMES Lynen, Feodor Felix Konrad (full name)
BRIEF DESCRIPTION German biochemist, winner of the Nobel Prize for Medicine in 1964
DATE OF BIRTH April 6, 1911
PLACE OF BIRTH Munich
DATE OF DEATH August 6, 1979
Place of death Munich