Joseph Straub

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Joseph Straub (born March 31, 1911 in Waldshut ; † June 21, 1987 in Cologne ) was a German biologist , botanist and breeding researcher . As a botanist since 1937, i.e. very early on, he showed a high affinity for genetic and molecular biological issues. As part of his training in 1937 , he had processed and internalized the “ three-man work ” by Max Delbrück , Nikolai Timofejew-Ressowski and Karl Günther Zimmer “On the nature of gene mutation and gene structure” (1935), which significantly promoted a theory of mutation. Accordingly, he later promoted genetic and molecular biology research in Germany due to his organizational talent. In contrast, his personal research area remained true to his early polyploidy research, plant breeding. Straub proved to be a researcher with a "great foresight in science policy."

Life

Straub studied natural sciences for teaching at grammar schools at the universities of Munich and Freiburg im Breisgau . Between 1934 and 1936 he taught as an assessor at the Friedrich-Gymnasium in Freiburg . He received his doctorate in 1936 under Friedrich Oehlkers with the dissertation "Investigations on the Physiology of Meiosis II " at the University of Freiburg . At the same time he did research at the Botanical Institute of the University of Freiburg from 1935 and stayed there until 1939. He completed his habilitation in 1939 at the University of Freiburg with a thesis on polyploidy induction. Then he went to Fritz von Wettstein at the Kaiser Wilhelm Institute for Biology in Berlin-Dahlem. Since 1945 he has been managing the departments of this Kaiser Wilhelm Institute that have been outsourced to Hechingen and Bad Boll.

In 1944 Straub could no longer accept the appointment to the University of Würzburg because the institute was bombed . In 1948 Straub accepted the appointment to the chair for botany at the University of Cologne. In 1953 he was appointed full professor for microbiology there. In addition to his scientific work at the university, he was also entrusted with the management of the botanical garden . On his initiative in 1959, the first molecular genetic institute in Germany was set up at the University of Cologne by Carsten Bresch and Max Delbrück , which served as a model for the development of further institutes. In addition to this establishment of the molecular genetic chair, he achieved the restoration of the chair for developmental physiology and the establishment of further chairs for microbiology and radiation biology. From 1961 until his retirement in 1978, Straub was also director of the Max Planck Institute for Breeding Research (MPIZ) in Cologne.

In 1960 he became a member of the German Academy of Sciences Leopoldina .

Publications (selection)

  • Investigations on the physiology of meiosis II. 1936 (= dissertation).
  • Polyploidy triggered by the effects of temperature. 1939 (= habilitation)

literature

  • Hans Geidel: Joseph Straub in the German biography
  • Simone Wenkel: Molecular biology in Germany from 1945 to 1975. An international comparison. (PDF; 1.5 MB) In: kups.ub.uni-koeln.de. Kölner UniversitätsPublikationsServer, 2013, accessed on May 12, 2020 (There comments on Joseph Straub with regard to the structure of the Institute for Genetics at the University of Cologne, in particular pages 33 to 35).
  • Joseph Straub. In: Walther Killy u. a. (Ed.): Deutsche Biographische Enzyklopädie , Vol. 9, p. 571. Some statements in the article on Joseph Straub such as B. the assumption of a professorship at the University of Würzburg in 1944 are incorrect! They are based on sources that were already “obsolete” in 1944.
  • L. Jaenicke: "Obituary for Joseph Straub." In: Westfälische Akademie der Wissenschaften, yearbook 1987. Opladen: Westdeutscher Verlag.
  • HF Linskens, Georg Melchers: Joseph Straub. In: Botanica Acta 102 (1989).

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ a b c d e f g h i j k Hans Geidel: Joseph Straub In: Deutsche Biographie.
  2. ↑ a b c d e f g h i j k Simone Wenkel: Molecular biology in Germany from 1945 to 1975.
  3. ↑ a b c d Joseph Straub. In: Walther Killy u. a .: German Biographical Encyclopedia.
  4. ↑ Straub was able to win funding from the Volkswagen Foundation for the establishment of the Institute for Molecular Biology at the University of Cologne .

Web links

personal data
SURNAME Straub, Joseph
ALTERNATIVE NAMES Straub, Joseph Peter (full name)
BRIEF DESCRIPTION German biologist, botanist and breeding researcher
DATE OF BIRTH March 31, 1911
PLACE OF BIRTH Waldshut
DATE OF DEATH June 21, 1987
Place of death Cologne