Constantin Zwenger

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Constantin Zwenger (1814-1884).
The Zwengersche Institute for Chemical Pharmacy at the Philipps University of Marburg (1873).
Gravestone on the honorary grave of the city of Marburg / Lahn.

Constantin Zwenger , also Konstantin or Constantinus Zwenger (* December 12, 1814 in Fulda , † March 15, 1884 in Marburg ) was the founder of the field of pharmaceutical chemistry .

Life

Zwenger first studied medicine and then went for a very short time as an assistant doctor to his father, the medical councilor Johann Adam Damian Zwenger, who was the chief doctor of the Wilhelms Hospital in Fulda. Zwenger very quickly moved back to the university to study chemistry there without his father's knowledge. Zwenger's father was a doctor, his grandfather Ignatz Zwenger a pharmacist and his brother Franz Ignatz Zwenger also a pharmacist and professor at the Adolphs University in Fulda. As a child, Constantin Zwenger had already followed many conversations between the three aforementioned at home, where the father complained that the pharmacy could not provide him with proper, qualitatively and quantitatively safe drugs. The inadequate therapy for heart failure was often referred to here. Due to the poor adjustment possibilities of the patients, these were often under or overdosed, so that the glycoside whip often caused further damage to the heart. The doctor complained that he lost many patients as a result.

Constantin Zwenger saw opportunities through chemistry to bring this problem closer to a solution. Ergo he studied with Justus v. Liebig at the University of Giessen Chemistry and then Pharmacy. Here he met Robert Bunsen . An intense friendship developed between the two. Zwenger told Bunsen about the conversations in his parents' house - but also about the conclusions he drew from them. Bunsen was able to understand this and offered Zwenger to join him in Marburg at the chair for pharmacy. After the exam, he actually switched to Bunsen, who had meanwhile received a call to the University of Jena . Bunsen proposed Zwenger to the Senate by saying that he held Zwenger in high regard as a scientist and teacher.

After receiving his doctorate in 1841, he became an associate professor at the Medical Faculty and head of the Pharmaceutical Institute at the University of Marburg . From 1852 he was a full professor of pharmaceutical chemistry there. At every opportunity, Zwenger pointed out that he was a chemist when asked what he was, a doctor, pharmacist or chemist. Even on the tombstone that is preserved on his grave in Marburg, it says: Dr. med. Constantin Zwenger Professor of Chemistry.

Zwenger published, among other things, " Chemical Constitution of Cholesterol " (1848).

One of Zwenger's brothers was Ferdinand Zwenger , founder and publisher of the first political daily newspaper (" Fuldaer Anzeiger ") in Fulda.

literature

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ see Hessian State Archives Marburg (HStAMR), Cat. 915 no. 5664, p 93 ( digitized ) ..
personal data
SURNAME Zwenger, Constantin
ALTERNATIVE NAMES Zwenger, Konstantin; Zwenger, Constantinus (full name)
BRIEF DESCRIPTION German pharmacist
DATE OF BIRTH December 12, 1814
PLACE OF BIRTH Fulda
DATE OF DEATH March 15, 1884
Place of death Marburg