Justus Mühlenpfordt

Justus Mühlenpfordt (born April 22, 1911 in Lübeck ; † October 2, 2000 ) was a German physicist and since 1969 a corresponding member of the Academy of Sciences of the GDR .

Life

Justus Mühlenpfordt was born in Lübeck on April 22, 1911, the son of the architecture professor Carl Mühlenpfordt and the painter Anna Dräger-Mühlenpfordt . He received extensive humanistic training. He studied physics at the Technical University Carolo-Wilhelmina in Braunschweig , where he received his doctorate in 1936 with a thesis on the subject of an investigation into the possibility of increasing the measuring sensitivity of the interferential refractor according to Jamin by photoelectric means .

As early as 1935, he was working in Gustav Hertz's laboratory at Siemens AG on the basics of developing X-ray devices. An X-ray tube with a special anode for generating very hard X-rays was named after him. Hertz led research in the field of isotope separation , which Mühlenpfordt was also interested in.

In 1945 he went to the Soviet Union with Gustav Hertz and Peter Adolf Thiessen and other specialists . Here they worked on the Soviet atomic bomb project . The main task was to separate stable isotopes, especially ¹⁰ boron, which is important for nuclear technology . In the institute in Agudsera, southeast of Sukhumi , headed by Gustav Hertz, Mühlenpfordt was responsible, among other things, for the development of a condensation pump . Around 1950 he became head of a design office in Leningrad.

After the front of the return from the Soviet Union customary for scientists "cooling off period" for decoupling from the latest research went Justus Mühlenpfordt 1955 to Leipzig and founded here in 1957, the Institute for physical material separation , the 1964 Institute of stable isotopes was called and 1970 in Central Institute of Isotope and radiation research came up. Methods for the separation of stable isotopes were developed here, these were produced on a semi-industrial scale and methods for their application and measurement were developed. The institute represented a certain uniqueness in the research landscape. The nuclide ¹⁵ N achieved internationally highly respected results in the elucidation of mechanisms of action in medicine, biology and agriculture. From 1964, the research results were mainly published in the specialist journal Isotopenpraxis founded by Justus Mühlenpfordt (stable isotopes) and Carl Friedrich Weiss (radionuclides) .

In 1968 Mühlenpfordt left the institute and from 1969 until his retirement in 1974 he took over the management of the research area nuclear and isotope technology at the Academy of Sciences, which from 1970 was called the research area nuclear sciences and later belonged to the research area physics.

In his retirement he dealt with art history, philosophy and history, but also with physical problems of television reception and the possible earthquake prediction by measuring low-frequency vibrations of the earth's surface.

Honors and memberships

• 1961 National Prize of the GDR, 2nd class for science and technology (with a collective from the Institute for Physical Material Separation Leipzig)
• 1969 Corresponding member of the Academy of Sciences of the GDR
• 1993 member of the Leibniz Society of Sciences in Berlin eV

Publications

• Justus Mühlenpfordt: Investigation into the possibility of increasing the measuring sensitivity of the interferential refractor according to Jamin by photoelectric means. Mühlenpfordt, - Charlottenburg, 1937
• Aleksandr J. Brodsky; Justus Mühlenpfordt: Isotopenchemie , Berlin: Akad.-Verl., 1961.
• Justus Mühlenpfordt: The application of stable isotopes . In Gustav Hertz (ed.): Textbook of nuclear physics. Vol. 3. Applied nuclear physics , BG Teubner Verlagsgesellschaft, 1962, pp. 222–262
• Justus Mühlenpfordt, Günter Kretzschmann, Klaus Wetzel: Third workshop on stable isotopes from October 28 to November 2, 1963 in Leipzig, organized by the Leipzig Institute for Physical Separation of the German Academy of Sciences in Berlin: Conference report , Berlin: Akademie-Verlag, 1965
• Justus Mühlenpfordt: For the organization and management of the research work and the use of its results , Berlin-Adlershof: Deutsche Akademie d. Sciences zu Berlin, Working Group f. Scientific organization with the chairman d. Research community d. scientific, technical and medical institutes, 1967

literature

• Werner Hartkopf (Ed.): The Berlin Academy of Sciences: its members and award winners 1700–1990 , Akademie Verlag, 1992, ISBN 978-3-05-002153-9 , p. 251
• Justus Mühlenpfordt on his 60th birthday , Isotopepraxis, 7th year, issue 4, 1971 (digital: doi: 10.1080 / 10256017108622095 )

Web links

• Werner Scheler: Obituary for Justus Mühlenpfordt. (PDF) Leibniz-Sozietät , 2001, accessed on November 8, 2014 . 

Individual evidence

1. ^ Dissertation Google Books , accessed on November 8, 2014.
2. ^ Pavel V. Oleynikov: German Scientists in the Soviet Atomic Project , The Nonproliferation Review Volume 7, Number 2, 1–30 (digitized version )
3. ↑ see list of winners of the National Prize of the GDR, 2nd class for science and technology (1960–1969)
4. ↑ Werner Scheler: Obituary for Justus Mühlenpfordt