Kurt Rauhe

Kurt Rauhe (born December 14, 1922 in Essen-Stoppenberg , † March 7, 1994 in Rostock ) was a German agricultural scientist. He is considered the most prominent soil fertility researcher in the GDR.

Life

Kurt Rauhe, son of a miner, studied agriculture at the University of Rostock from 1948 to 1951 and then worked as a department head at the Institute for Arable and Crop Production in Müncheberg (Mark). Here he mainly dealt with questions about the improvement of sandy soils remote from the groundwater through meliorative tillage. In the meantime he received his doctorate in 1954 with Asmus Petersen at the University of Rostock and completed his habilitation in 1960 at the Humboldt University in Berlin . In 1962 he followed a call to the University of Leipzig as professor and director of the Institute for Arable and Crop Production. In connection with the third university reform in the GDR, he had to move his institute to the University of Halle in 1969 . As a professor at the Plant Production Section, he represented the field of "Agricultural Basics" until his retirement in 1988.

Research priorities

The central research topic of Rauhe was soil fertility . He paid particular attention to the problem of humus reproduction under conditions of intensive agriculture. Repeatedly he turned against an excessive specialization of agricultural production in the GDR. His research on the material cycle in agricultural land use systems and his recommendations for ecologically oriented land management are also noteworthy. Of the publications by Rauhe , the book Ackerbau , written together with Erich Rübensam , deserves special mention - a didactically excellent university textbook that has been a helpful guide for many generations of students. Rauhe published most of his scientific treatises in the Albrecht-Thaer archive , in the archive for arable and crop production and soil science and in the publications of the German Academy of Agricultural Sciences in Berlin.

Honors

Rauhe received high state awards for his successful work in the field of soil fertility research. He received the GDR Medal of Merit in 1960, the Bronze Patriotic Order of Merit in 1962 and the GDR III National Prize in 1963 . Class in the collective and 1983 the Patriotic Order of Merit in silver. Since 1963 he was a member of the Academy of Agricultural Sciences in Berlin.

Fonts (selection)

• Erich Rübensam and Kurt Rauhe: Agriculture . VEB Deutscher Landwirtschaftsverlag Berlin 1964, 2nd edition, ibid. 1968.
• Possibilities of humus substitution through fertilization and plants . Meeting reports of the German Academy of Agricultural Sciences in Berlin, Vol. 13, No. 6, 1964.
• Thoughts on the future design of the humus substitute economy in the context of industrial production methods . Meeting reports of the German Academy of Agricultural Sciences in Berlin, Vol. 15, No. 1, 1966.

literature

• Theophil Gerber: personalities from agriculture, forestry, horticulture and veterinary medicine. Biographical Lexicon . NORA Verlagsgemeinschaft Dyck & Westerheide, Berlin 2004, ISBN 3-936735-67-0
• Günter Leithold: Professor Dr. sc. agr. Kurt Rauhe on his 65th birthday . In: Archive for arable and plant cultivation and soil science, Vol. 31, 1987, pp. 693-694 (with picture).
• Günter Leithold: Prof. Dr. Kurt Rauhe died. A pioneer of organic farming in East Germany . In: Ökologie und Landbau Jg. 22, 1994, H. 91, P. 66 (with picture).
• Günter Leithold u. Diethard Rost: Obituary for Prof. em. Dr. habil. Kurt Rauhe . In: Kühn Archive Vol. 88, 1994, pp. 247–248 (with picture).
• Bodo Hofmann and Christian Moritz: In memory of Prof. Dr. habil. Kurt Rauhe (December 14, 1922 - March 7, 1994) . In: Faculty messenger of the Society for the Promotion of Agricultural and Nutritional Sciences at the Martin Luther University Halle-Wittenberg e. V. year 2009, no. 1, pp. 47-49 (with picture).

Web links

• Kurt Rauhe in the professorial catalog of the University of Leipzig