Herbert Schober

Herbert Schober

Herbert Schober (born March 14, 1905 in Innsbruck ; † June 15, 1975 ) was an Austrian - German physicist and ophthalmologist . He dealt with physical optics .

Life

Herbert Schober attended high schools in Bruneck, Meran and Innsbruck. During this time he was already very interested in experimental physics and medicine. He carried out experiments in his parents' house, often not to their delight. The maternal grandfather was the historian Arnold Busson , another relative of the writer Paul Busson .

In 1923 he began studying physics and medicine in Innsbruck and continued in Prague and Vienna. When Eduard Haschek he was in 1928 as a 23-year-old Dr. phil. PhD in physics with the thesis The Spectra of the Wehnelt Interrupter .

Vienna and Berlin

During his time as an assistant at the Institute for Applied Physics at the Technical University in Vienna from 1928 to 1934, he completed his habilitation in 1933 on the subject of the spectra of rhenium , while at that time he was already engaged in physical-optical investigations. After a year as a private lecturer, he came to the Oceanographic Institute in Gothenburg in Sweden as a guest scientist for two years until 1937 and also worked in the spectroscopic laboratory of the physical-technical Reichsanstalt in Berlin. During his time in Berlin, studies were carried out on the vision of the human eye under artificial lighting , which are still valid today. In 1937 Schober came back to Vienna and was associate professor for lighting technology at the Technical University of Vienna until 1938. In 1938 Schober was appointed director of the Institute for Medical Physics at the University of Veterinary Medicine, Vienna . In 1940 he was appointed full professor at the Institute for Applied Physics at the Technical University of Vienna.

Hamburg and Borstel

In July 1940 he was assigned to the technical staff of the German Naval Observatory in Hamburg ( German Hydrographic Institute ). He served as a naval officer in the German Wehrmacht until the end of the war. During this time he did research on optotype visibility, observations on night myopia, and glare studies. The close contact with Prof. Manfred Monjé resulted from his time in Hamburg , which prompted him to devote his further life to physical medicine and physiological optics. After a year as a prisoner of war in England, he went to the University of Innsbruck as an intern for a few weeks .

Schober then studied medicine at the University of Hamburg . At the Hamburg Eye Clinic, he completed his training as a specialist in ophthalmology with Oswald Marchesani . His medical dissertation was entitled Physiological-optical considerations on the possibility of stereoscopic X-ray fluoroscopy . In 1950 he received his doctorate. In 1949 he was appointed director of the physical department at the Borstel Tuberculosis Research Institute in Holstein (until 1954). From 1955 to 1956 he was professor for medical physics at the University of Hamburg. During his time in Borstel and Hamburg, he was able to write the two-volume book Dassehen . The first volume appeared in 1950 and the second volume in 1954. In these volumes he deals with all physiological optical aspects of vision. The volumes experienced several editions.

Munich

In 1957, at the suggestion and with the support of the optical industry, a chair for medical optics was created in Munich, and the Ludwig Maximilians University in Munich appointed Schober to the board. Schober was able to bring the institute to national and international renown in a relatively short time. Numerous works on ophthalmic optics , ophthalmology and X-ray physics resulted from the institute. The Schober course is still a popular course in training young ophthalmologists to learn how to identify glasses.

Herbert Schober died unexpectedly on June 15, 1975 of an instant heart death . His grave is in the cemetery of the Heilig-Kreuz-Kirche near Hall in Tirol .

Awards

Schober received numerous honors and honorary memberships from professional societies. In 1971 the Technical University of Munich awarded him an honorary doctorate in medicine. In recent years, Schober has given guest lectures, some for longer periods, in the United States, Australia, India, Malaysia and Japan.

Activities and research focus

Schober wrote about 330 scientific papers, for example studies on visual acuity and the resolution of optical instruments, on reflection and polarization properties of road surfaces, on anti-glare glasses , on the visibility of optotypes , on the night myopia and its causes. He invented a new dark adaptometer (for examining twilight vision), dealt with problems of x-ray stereoscopy , examined the Landolt ring as a standard symbol for determining visual acuity, dealt scientifically with the sun protection glass and introduced new methods for determining refraction ( glasses determination ). Schober dealt with lighting in offices and production rooms, with visual problems with work lighting and driving, and with seeing on the screen. He also wrote about the importance of the eye for road safety, published about image sharpness and image contrast, examined binocular vision and the chromatic aberration of the human eye and dealt with unbreakable glasses. In addition, he developed an examination method that is used in strabology for the qualitative examination of simultaneous viewing and fusion and which became known as the Schober test .

literature

• Gregor Henke, commemorative speech for Prof. Dr. Dr. Herbert Schober . In: The specialist lectures of the Scientific Association for Ophthalmic Optics and Optometry e. V., annual congress 1976 in Karlsruhe, work volume, 26th special edition, Bad Godesberg, Mainz 1976, pp. 9–21. 225 publications by Schober are listed here.
• Franz Daxecker , On the 100th birthday and 30th anniversary of Prof. Dr. Herbert Schober . In: Klin Mbl. Augenheilk 221, pp. 133-134 (2004).