Hans Nachtsheim

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Hans Nachtsheim (born June 13, 1890 in Koblenz , † November 24, 1979 in Boppard ) was a German zoologist and geneticist . Before the Second World War he worked as a professor of genetics at Berlin universities and at the Kaiser Wilhelm Institute for Anthropology , and after the war until 1948 at the Berlin University , then at the Free University of Berlin and in the Max Planck Society .

Career

Study and start of scientific work

Nachtsheim studied zoology before the First World War . During the war he worked as a military censor. After an assistantship at zoological institutes in Freiburg and Munich, he became a private lecturer in 1919 and an associate professor at the Agricultural University of Berlin in 1921. In 1921 he became head of department at the Institute for Heredity Research, a research facility at the Agricultural University in Berlin . In 1923 he became an associate professor there. From 1924 to 1933 he headed the Reich Association of German Rabbit Breeders . 1925–1927 he was a Rockefeller Fellow at Colombia University with Thomas Hunt Morgan . He has been researching hereditary diseases of small mammals since 1934 and, with the support of the German Research Foundation, organized the establishment of central breeding institutions. The rabbits for his experiments were raised by inmates from the Sonnenburg prison near Küstrin , among others .

Employment at the Kaiser Wilhelm Institute and active participation in human experiments

From 1941 to 1945 Nachtsheim was head of the department for experimental hereditary pathology at the Kaiser Wilhelm Institute for Anthropology, Human Heredity and Eugenics (KWI-A), whose acting director he became in 1943. In 1944 he became a scientific member of the Kaiser Wilhelm Society (later the Max Planck Society ). In 1944, on behalf of the Reich Research Council, Nachtsheim carried out investigations into "comparative and experimental genetic pathology", initially examining the influence of negative pressure or lack of oxygen on the triggering of an epileptic seizure in epileptic and non-epileptic rabbits. In 1943 he "[b] used six children with epilepsy from the provincial sanatorium and nursing home Brandenburg-Görden , headed by the Reichsausschuß expert Hans Heinze , for a negative pressure experiment". He had an indirect connection to human experiments in the field of tuberculosis research and also to research on the eyes of people murdered in Auschwitz , in which his colleague Karin Magnussen was significantly involved.

Activities after 1945

As one of two members of the KWI-A who “definitely had no connection to the NSDAP ”, Hans Nachtsheim was able to become an important figure in the development of genetics in the Federal Republic. From 1946 to 1949 he was Professor of Genetics and Director of the Institute for Genetics at the Humboldt University in Berlin. He gave up this position in 1948 because of serious scientific differences that arose from Lyssenko's theories favored in the Eastern Bloc . Lyssenko represented the theory of the direct inheritance of acquired traits in genetics, which is now considered to be refuted, but was supported by Stalin at the time . In 1949, Nachtsheim was appointed to a chair for general biology at the Free University of Berlin, where he was one of the founders of the Institute for Genetics, which he headed until his retirement as professor in 1955. At the same time, he was director of the Institute for Comparative Hereditary Biology and Hereditary Pathology at the German Research University, which had emerged from Nachtsheim's department at KWI-A after the war and was affiliated to the Max Planck Society in 1953. He headed this Institute for Comparative Hereditary Biology and Hereditary Pathology of the Max Planck Society from 1953 to 1960. Since aeronautical medical research (and thus also the negative pressure tests in which Nachtsheim was involved) escaped a precise examination and escaped conviction in the Nuremberg Doctors' Trial Nachtsheim was never held accountable for his research activities during the Nazi era.

Positioning on practical eugenics

It is obvious that racial hygiene , as practiced during the Nazi era, was no longer a recognized science after the war - but eugenic ideas persisted. In the 1950s a new debate about sterilization flared up . Forced sterilization was no longer justifiable, but lawyers and doctors discussed whether voluntary sterilization might not be legal. Nachtsheim, who was originally a zoologist and was not a eugenicist at the time of his activity at KWI-A , was the only geneticist to interfere in the debate at a time when eugenics was actually being replaced by a differently oriented human genetics . Nachtsheim spoke of the fact that there was a “duty to practice eugenics” and that “the basic evil, the damaged genetic material”, had to be fought. Through the therapy of hereditary diseases, diseased genes escaped “eradication” and “the spread of the gene increases the more the success of the therapy progresses”. In this way, those affected and carriers should be informed about not having children and being sterilized voluntarily. To Nachtheim's chagrin, “sterilization for eugenic indications” is not permitted in Germany, although it is “the task and duty of the state and its society” to “pave the way for the citizens to achieve successful genetic health care”.

Further commitment

In the post-war period, Nachtsheim, who lived in West Berlin, was also involved in the Congress for Cultural Freedom , an international organization that was supported by the American government in order to strengthen pro-Western and anti-communist attitudes through intellectuals and academics. In particular, the Congress stressed the need for science to be free from control by totalitarian ideologies and powers. Hans Nachtsheim was involved in the founding of the 1950 congress in Berlin and in its publications. In the publication of the congress, Nachtsheim spoke of the "destruction of genetics in Russia by Lysenko and his accomplices" and called Lyssenko's theories as absurd as the racial theories of National Socialism.

Nachtsheim retired as professor in 1955, and in the following year he became a member of the Federal Health Conference . In this role he became an opponent of Franz Büchner in the Contergan scandal . In contrast to this, he mainly emphasized the causes that can be found in the genetic make-up and denied the triggering effect of the thalidomide drug for malformations .

He was one of the three founders of the international journal Blut for clinical and experimental hematology, which has existed since 1955 . The obituary of the magazine Blut honors Nachtsheim's particular personal courage in representing his positions on science-political problems.

Hans Nachtsheim died in Boppard in 1979 at the age of 89. His grave is in the Dahlem Forest Cemetery in Berlin.

Honors

Nachtsheim was awarded the Great Federal Cross of Merit with a Star .

Fonts (selection)

  • From wild animal to pet. Metzner, Berlin 1936.
  • For and against sterilization for a eugenic indication. Georg Thieme Verlag, Stuttgart 1952.
  • Our duty to practical eugenics. In: Federal Health Gazette. 6, 1963, pp. 277-286.
  • Fight hereditary diseases. Franz Decker Verlag Nachf., Schmiden near Stuttgart 1966.

literature

  • Ute Deichmann : Hans Nachtsheim, a Human Geneticist under National Socialism and the Question of Freedom of Science. In: Michael Fortun, Everett Mendelsohn (Ed.): The practices of human genetics. Dordrecht 1999, pp. 143-153.
  • Michael Engel:  Nachtsheim, Hans. In: New German Biography (NDB). Volume 18, Duncker & Humblot, Berlin 1997, ISBN 3-428-00199-0 , pp. 684-686 ( digitized version ).
  • Ernst Klee : The dictionary of persons on the Third Reich: Who was what before and after 1945. Fischer-Taschenbuch-Verlag, Frankfurt am Main 2007, ISBN 978-3-596-16048-8 .
  • G. Koch: Human genetics and neuropsychiatry in my time (1932–1978). Years of decision . Verlag Palm and Enke, Erlangen / Jena 1993.
  • Gerhard Ruhenstroth-Bauer : Hans Nachtsheim †. In: blood. Vol. 40, 1980, pp. 105-106.
  • Hans-Walter Schmuhl (Ed.): Race research at Kaiser Wilhelm Institutes before and after 1933 . Wallstein Verlag, Göttingen 2003.
  • Alexander von Schwerin: Experimentalization of the human being: the geneticist Hans Nachtsheim and the comparative hereditary pathology 1920-1945 . Wallstein, Göttingen 2004, ISBN 3-89244-773-X .
  • P. Weindling: Genetics and human experiments in Germany, 1940–1950. Hans Nachtsheim, the rabbits from Dahlem and the children from Bullenhuser Damm. In: H.-W. Schmuhl (Ed.): Race research at Kaiser Wilhelm Institutes before and after 1933. Wallstein Verlag, Göttingen 2003, pp. 245–274.
  • P. Weingart , J. Kroll, K. Bayertz : Race, blood and genes. History of eugenics in Germany . Suhrkamp Verlag, Frankfurt am Main 1992, ISBN 3-518-28622-6 .

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ a b Ernst Klee : The dictionary of persons on the Third Reich. Who was what before and after 1945. 2., act. Edition. Fischer Taschenbuch Verlag, Frankfurt am Main 2005, ISBN 3-596-16048-0 , p. 427.
  2. ^ A b c d Gerhard Ruhenstroth-Bauer: Hans Nachtsheim †. In: blood. Vol. 40, 1980, pp. 105-106.
  3. ↑ H.-W. Schmuhl (ed.): Race research at Kaiser Wilhelm Institutes before and after 1933. Wallstein Verlag, Göttingen 2003, p. 336 and G. Koch: Human genetics and neuropsychiatry in my time (1932–1978). 1993, p. 124ff.
  4. ^ P. Weindling: Genetics and human experiments in Germany, 1940-1950. Hans Nachtsheim, the rabbits from Dahlem and the children from Bullenhuser Damm. 2003.
  5. ↑ The research on human eyes sent from the Auschwitz concentration camp was carried out at the KWI-A by Karin Magnussen . Alexander von Schwerin '2004' denies that Nachtsheim was involved in such research, but writes: “ But he was close, and he must have known a lot. ". Compare Richard Friebe : Shine and hereditary health. A geneticist for the nation's top rabbit breeder. In: Frankfurter Allgemeine Sonntagszeitung. July 15, 2012, p. 55.
  6. ↑ P. Weingart , J. Kroll, K. Bayertz : Race, Blood and Genes. History of eugenics in Germany. 1992, p. 418.
  7. ^ Hans-Walter Schmuhl (Ed.): Race research at Kaiser Wilhelm Institutes before and after 1933 . Wallstein Verlag, Göttingen 2003, p. 336.
  8. ^ H. Nachtsheim: Our duty to practical eugenics. 1963, p. 277.
  9. ^ H. Nachtsheim: Our duty to practical eugenics. 1963, p. 278.
  10. ^ H. Nachtsheim: Fight the hereditary diseases. 1966, p. 92.
  11. ^ H. Nachtsheim: Fight the hereditary diseases. 1966, p. 93.
  12. ^ H. Nachtsheim: Fight the hereditary diseases. 1966, p. 99.
  13. ^ H. Nachtsheim: Fight the hereditary diseases. 1966, p. 112.
  14. ^ The Congress for Freedom of Culture: Science and Freedom. International Conference Hamburg, 23. – 26. July 1953. Organized by the Congress for Freedom of Culture and the University of Hamburg. Grunewald-Verlag, Berlin 1954.
  15. ↑ Hans Nachtsheim: The Latest Development in Soviet Genetics. In: The Congress for Freedom of Culture: Science and Freedom. International Conference Hamburg, 23.-26. July 1953. Organized by the Congress for Freedom of Culture and the University of Hamburg. Grunewald-Verlag, Berlin 1954, p. 235.
  16. ^ Hans-Jürgen Mende: Lexicon of Berlin burial places . Pharus-Plan, Berlin 2018, ISBN 978-3-86514-206-1 , p. 585.
personal data
SURNAME Nachtsheim, Hans
BRIEF DESCRIPTION German zoologist and geneticist
DATE OF BIRTH June 13, 1890
PLACE OF BIRTH Koblenz
DATE OF DEATH November 24, 1979
Place of death Boppard