Dieter Mettin

Dieter Mettin (born  February 1, 1932 in Berlin ; †  August 25, 2004 in Naumburg ) was a German agricultural scientist and plant geneticist . From 1977 to 1983 he worked as a professor of plant breeding at the University of Halle-Wittenberg and then until 1991 as director of the Central Institute for Genetics and Crop Plant Research of the Academy of Sciences of the GDR .

Life

Dieter Mettin was born in Berlin in 1932 and completed an agricultural training in Salzmünde after attending school in his hometown and in Eisleben . He then studied until 1955 Agricultural Science at the University of Halle-Wittenberg , where he also six years later under Hans Stubbe in the field of plant breeding and genetics doctorate and in 1977 habilitation was. From 1956 to 1961 he worked as a research assistant at the Institute for Crop Plant Research in Gatersleben , which, as a non-university research institute, belonged to the research association of the German Academy of Sciences in Berlin, which later became the Academy of Sciences of the GDR .

He then moved to the Institute for Plant Breeding at the University of Halle-Wittenberg, located in Hohenthurm Castle , where he established the cytogenetics of cereal plants as a new field of research and was appointed full professor for plant breeding in 1977. Wolf-Dieter Blüthner and Rolf Schlegel , who continued his work, were among his most important students . In addition, he was vice dean of the university's agricultural faculty from 1970 to 1972. In 1983 Dieter Mettin accepted a call to the Gatersleben Academy Institute, which had been transformed into the Central Institute for Genetics and Crop Plant Research , where he succeeded Helmut Böhme as the director of the institute until Klaus Müntz took over this function at the beginning of May 1990 . In 2004 Dieter Mettin died in Naumburg (Saale) .

Scientific work

Dieter Mettin, who was a member of the Academy of Agricultural Sciences of the GDR , published over 100 scientific publications as well as conference and book contributions in the course of his career . His research interests included diverse aspects of both basic research and applied research in the field of crop breeding, including the cytotaxonomy of the genus Vicia , the induction of polyploidy in Brassicaceae and rye , the production and use of aneuploids in Aegilops grasses, rye and in wheat , on genes for resistance to leaf diseases and on the application of molecular genetic and biotechnological processes in plant breeding. He was internationally regarded as a pioneer of aneuploidy research in wheat.

literature

• Rolf Schlegel: Dr. Dieter Mettin. Obituary in: Annual Wheat Newsletter. 51/2005. Wheat Genetic and Genomic Resources Center at Kansas State University, p. 4
• Mettin, Dieter. In: Gerhard Röbbelen (Hrsg.): Biographical lexicon for the history of plant breeding. Third episode. Series: Lectures on Plant Breeding. Volume 66. Society for Plant Breeding, Göttingen 2004, p. 126, ISSN  0723-7812

Web links

• Annual Wheat Newsletter 2005: Dr. Dieter Mettin (English, with picture)