Eberhard Gwinner

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Eberhard Gwinner (born December 26, 1938 in Stuttgart ; † September 7, 2004 ) was a German ornithologist and behavioral researcher and founding director of the Max Planck Institute for Ornithology ( Andechs , Radolfzell , Seewiesen ). An obituary in the journal Nature said that Gwinner was "one of the most influential researchers in the field of ornithology in the second half of the 20th century".

Career

"Ebo" Gwinner completed his doctoral thesis on the social behavior of ravens in 1964 in Gustav Kramer's group at the Max Planck Institute for Behavioral Physiology and then worked in the ornithological branch in Andechs with Jürgen Aschoff . Since 1991 he has headed the "Gwinner Department" of the Max Planck Institute for Behavioral Physiology in Andechs and since 1998 the Max Planck Research Center for Ornithology, which emerged from the Radolfzell Ornithological Institute and the MPI for Behavioral Physiology years of initiative - had been converted into the independent Max Planck Institute for Ornithology .

Research work

Eberhard Gwinner was one of the world's leading scientists in the field of research into biological rhythms and was considered one of the most knowledgeable experts in chronobiology . In the 1960s, Gwinner was, at the same time as (but independently of) Ted Pengelley, the first researcher who was able to demonstrate experimentally the innate annual rhythms . Gwinner researched, among other things, daily and annual rhythms in birds, their spatial learning during bird migration and the physiology and strategies of bird migration, as well as the hormonal control of their behavior, flight mechanics and flight physiology.

Based on experiments with birds that he kept under constant light conditions, Gwinner's doctoral supervisor Jürgen Aschoff had postulated that they have an internal, innate oscillator that enables animals kept in permanent light to change their daily activity over a longer period of time. and to maintain rest periods. Aschoff was also able to prove that this “internal clock” is fine-tuned in the open air through the natural change of day and night. However, these research results did not explain how migratory birds that spend the winter months in tropical regions can recognize that the time has come to return to their summer territories: In the tropics there is hardly any change in the length of the day during the year. Thanks to his permanent position at a Max Planck Institute, Gwinner was able to devote himself to investigating this phenomenon for years - one of his experiments lasted twelve years. He was able to show that his test animals (especially Fitis and garden warbler ) showed a constant seasonal change in gonadal growth, moulting and migration behavior in the laboratory over the years if they were kept alternating between 12 hours of light and 12 hours of darkness. On the basis of precise behavioral observations, it was also possible to prove that the direction of the bird migration and its duration are also determined by internal, innate programs. The exact physiological mechanisms and the location of this internal “seasonal clock” are still unknown today.

Fonts (selection)

  • Investigations into the expressive and social behavior of the common raven (Corvus corax corax L.). In: Zeitschrift für Tierpsychologie. Volume 21, 1964, pp. 657-748
  • Peter Berthold , Eberhard Gwinner, Edith Sonnenschein: Avian Migration . 2003: Berlin (Springer Verlag), ISBN 3540434089 .

literature

  • Peter Berthold: Prof. Dr. Eberhard Gwinner (December 26, 1938-07 September 2004). In: Ornithologischer Anzeiger 44, 2004, pp. 47-48 ( online ).
  • Roland Brandstaetter, John Krebs: Eberhard Gwinner (1938-2004). Pioneer of circannual clock research. In: Nature . Volume 432, 2004, p. 687, doi: 10.1038 / 432687a
  • Rebecca L. Holberton and Kenneth P. Able: In Memoriam: Eberhard Gwinner, 1938-2004. In: The Auk. Vol. 122, No. 3, 2005, pp. 1013-1015.
  • Barbara Helm, Wolfgang Goymann: Eberhard Gwinner December 26, 1938 - September 7, 2004. In: Max Planck Society , Yearbook 2005, pp. 109–110.

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ "... one of the most influential ornithological researchers of the second half of the twentieth century ..." quoted from: Roland Brandstaetter, John Krebs: Eberhard Gwinner (1938-2004). Pioneer of circannual clock research. In: Nature . Volume 432, 2004, p. 687
personal data
SURNAME Gwinner, Eberhard
ALTERNATIVE NAMES Gwinner, Ebo
BRIEF DESCRIPTION German ornithologist and behavioral scientist
DATE OF BIRTH December 26, 1938
PLACE OF BIRTH Stuttgart
DATE OF DEATH September 7, 2004