List of Munich Nobel Prize winners

This page gives an overview of the Nobel Prize winners who were born in the urban area of Munich and / or did research there or had any connection to Munich.

Munich Nobel Prize Winner

Nobel Prize Winner	category	year	Acknowledged achievement	University	Relation to Munich	image
Wilhelm Conrad Röntgen (1845–1923)	physics	1901	was the first scientist to receive the Nobel Prize in Physics in 1901. Röntgen received the prize primarily for his research on the X-rays named after him, which he discovered in 1895 while working at the University of Würzburg. Wilhelm Conrad Röntgen was a professor at the Ludwig-Maximilians-Universität from 1900 to 1920 and retired in 1920.	LMU	From April 1, 1900, Röntgen worked as a professor at the University of Munich, where he also died	more pictures
Adolf von Baeyer (1835-1917)	chemistry	1905	was awarded the Nobel Prize for Chemistry in 1905, especially for the synthesis of indigo and triphenylmethane dyes. After Justus von Liebig's death, he was appointed to the Ludwig Maximilians University in 1873, where he set up a respected chemical laboratory and worked until his retirement.	LMU	from 1875 in Munich as the successor to Justus von Liebig .	more pictures
Paul Heyse (1830-1914)	literature	1910	he was awarded the Nobel Prize for Literature as the first German author of fiction works.	LMU	received a professorship in Romance philology in Munich in 1854 and died there	more pictures
Wilhelm Wien (1864–1928)	physics	1911	for his research on the laws of thermal radiation. Vienna received the Nobel Prize while working at the University of Würzburg. In 1920 he moved to the Ludwig-Maximilians-Universität in Munich, where, as in Würzburg, he succeeded Wilhelm Conrad Röntgen. Wilhelm Wien was rector of the LMU from 1925 to 1926.	LMU	At the end of 1919, Vienna went to the Ludwig Maximilians University in Munich to succeed Röntgen	more pictures
Max von Laue (1879–1960)	physics	1914	discovered the diffraction of X-rays on crystals during his time at the University of Frankfurt am Main. This enabled him to demonstrate both the wave character of this radiation and the structure of the crystals. In 1909 he came to the Ludwig Maximilians University as a private lecturer, where he gave lectures on optics, thermodynamics and the theory of relativity.	LMU	After studying in Strasbourg, Göttingen, Munich and Berlin, he joined the Institute for Theoretical Physics at LMU in 1909 as a private lecturer	more pictures
Richard Willstätter (1872–1942)	chemistry	1915	he was honored for his studies of the dyes in the plant kingdom, especially chlorophyll. Willstätter resigned as full professor in 1925 because, in his opinion, anti-Semitism was prevalent in appointments. Although he continued his research in Munich, he left the city for Switzerland in 1939 because of the intensified persecution of Jews.	LMU	After graduating from high school, he studied chemistry in Munich with Adolf von Baeyer	more pictures
Ludwig Quidde (1858–1941)	peace	1927	his achievements as a driving force in the German peace movement. For example, as long-time chairman of the German Peace Society (DFG), he was committed to the goals and organization of pacifism.		he returned to Munich in 1892 and was accepted into the historical class of the Bavarian Academy of Sciences. Here, with the help of the DZG, he also organized the First German Historians' Day in 1893.	more pictures
Heinrich Otto Wieland (1877–1957)	chemistry	1927	for his research on the composition of bile acid and related substances. Since he carried out research that was classified as important to the war effort, not only did several attempts to denounce him during the Nazi dictatorship come to nothing; he was also able to accept several so-called “half-Jews” as guests in his working group and thus avoid persecution by the state organs.	LMU	Willstätter's successor at the LMU Chemical Institute.	more pictures
Thomas Mann (1875–1955)	literature	1929	was awarded for his first novel " Buddenbrooks "		In 1894 he left the Katharineum in Lübeck prematurely as a senior second and went to Munich, where his mother had moved with the siblings a year earlier.	more pictures
Hans Fischer (1881–1945)	chemistry	1930	for his work "on the structure of blood and plant pigments and for the synthesis of heme"	TUM	He completed his chemistry studies in 1904 with a doctorate. This was followed by medical studies in Munich until 1908, and in 1908 Fischer received his doctorate in medicine	more pictures
Werner Heisenberg (1901–1976)	physics	1932	received the Nobel Prize in Physics at the age of 31 "for the establishment of quantum mechanics, the application of which - among other things - led to the discovery of the allotropic forms of hydrogen," said the laudation. Heisenberg formulated the uncertainty relation or uncertainty relation named after him.	LMU	Studied physics in Munich under Arnold Sommerfeld. From 1958 to 1970 he was director of the Max Planck Institute for Physics (now also known as the Werner Heisenberg Institute) in Munich. Heisenberg died in Munich in 1976 and was buried in the forest cemetery in Munich / Alter Teil.	more pictures
Adolf Butenandt (1903–1995)	chemistry	1939	the Nobel Prize in Chemistry for his research in the field of sex hormones. He shared the award with Leopold Ruzicka, a researcher at ETH Zurich. Butenandt was appointed to the Institute for Physiological Medicine at LMU in 1952. From 1955 until he took office as President of the Max Planck Society in 1960, Butenandt was both chairman of the Institute for Physiological Chemistry at LMU and director of the Max Planck Institute for Biochemistry.	LMU and MPI	1985: Honorary citizen of the city of Munich, where he died in 1995	more pictures
Rudolf Mößbauer (1929–2011)	physics	1961	"For his investigations into the resonance absorption of gamma radiation and the discovery made in this context of the effect named after him" (together with Robert Hofstadter )	TUM	Abitur at the Oberrealschule München-Pasing, doctorate with Professor Heinz Maier-Leibnitz, TUM. From 1964 he worked again at the Technical University of Munich, which awarded the former professor of experimental physics with the University's Golden Ring of Honor in 2004.	more pictures
Feodor Lynen (1911–1979)	medicine	1964	for his work on the mechanism and regulation of cholesterol and fatty acid metabolism together with Konrad Emil Bloch	LMU	Between 1930 and 1934 Lynen studied chemistry at the University of Munich, worked after completing his doctorate in 1937–42 as a scholarship holder of the Notgemeinschaft der deutschen Wissenschaft in the chemical laboratory of the Bavarian Academy of Sciences and completed his habilitation in 1941. He was born in Munich and died there.	more pictures
Konrad Emil Bloch (1912-2000)	medicine	1964	for physiology or medicine (together with Professor Feodor Lynen ) "for their discoveries concerning the mechanism and regulation of the cholesterol and fatty acid metabolism"	TUM	in 1930 he began studying chemistry at the Technical University of Munich, where he soon turned to organic chemistry	more pictures
Ernst Otto Fischer (1918-2007)	chemistry	1973	1973 (together with Professor Geoffrey Wilkinson) "for their pioneering work, performed independently, on the chemistry of the organometallic, so called sandwich compounds"	LMU and TUM	born in Munich and died there too. In 1937 he graduated from the Theresien-Gymnasium in Munich. In 1957, Fischer became an associate professor at the Ludwig Maximilians University of Munich (LMU). After an offer to succeed Franz Hein at the University of Jena was rejected, he became a personal professor at the LMU. In 1964 he followed his teacher Walter Hieber at the Technical University (from 1970 Technical University) in Munich to the chair for inorganic chemistry, which he held until his retirement in 1985.
Karl Ritter von Frisch (1886–1982)	medicine	1973	received the Nobel Prize for Physiology or Medicine together with Konrad Lorenz and Nikolaas Tinbergen. The award recognized “her discoveries about the organization and triggering of individual and social behavior patterns”.	LMU	Died in Munich in 1982. In 1910 he went to Richard von Hertwig as an assistant at the Zoological Institute of the University of Munich , where he became a private lecturer in zoology and comparative anatomy in 1912.
Klaus von Klitzing (* 1943)	physics	1985	for his discovery of the quantum Hall effect	TUM	In 1980, the Technical University of Munich appointed Klitzing to a professorship for solid state physics	more pictures
Ernst Ruska (1906–1988)	physics	1986	"for his fundamental work in electron optics, and for the design of the first electron microscope"	TUM	From 1925 studied electrical engineering at the Technical University of Munich
Karl Alexander Müller (* 1927)	physics	1987	together with Georg Bednorz “for their groundbreaking discovery of superconductivity in ceramic materials”.	TUM	Honorary doctorate from the Technical University of Munich	more pictures
Robert Huber (* 1937)	chemistry	1988	(together with Professor Johann Deisenhofer and Professor Hartmut Michel ) "for the determination of the three-dimensional structure of a photosynthetic reaction center"	TUM	Born in Munich, he studied, earned his doctorate and qualified as a professor in chemistry at the Technical University of Munich. From 1971 to March 2005 he was director at the Max Planck Institute for Biochemistry in Martinsried near Munich. Since 1976 he has also been an adjunct professor at the Technical University of Munich.	more pictures
Johann Deisenhofer (* 1943)	chemistry	1988	(together with Professor Robert Huber and Professor Hartmut Michel ) "for the determination of the three-dimensional structure of a photosynthetic reaction center"	TUM	In 1965 he began studying physics at the Technical University of Munich.
Wolfgang Paul (1913–1993)	physics	1989	(together with Professor Hans G. Dehmelt ) "for the development of the ion trap technique"	TUM	Stephan Paul holds the chair for experimental physics at the Technical University of Munich
Erwin Neher (* 1944)	medicine	1991	for physiology or medicine 1991 (together with Bert Sakmann ) "for their discoveries concerning the function of single ion channels in cells"	TUM	From 1963 he studied physics at the Technical University of Munich. At the Max Planck Institute for Psychiatry in Munich he received his doctorate in 1970 under Hans Dieter Lux (1924–1994)	more pictures
Wolfgang Ketterle (* 1957)	physics	2001	was honored together with Eric Allin Cornell and Carl Edwin Wieman "for the generation of the Bose-Einstein condensation in dilute gases from alkali atoms and for early fundamental studies on the properties of the condensates".	LMU and TUM	After completing his intermediate diploma, he moved to the Technical University of Munich. He took the direction of theoretical physics and graduated in 1982 on the spin relaxation of disordered materials, then he switched to Herbert Walther at the Max Planck Institute for Quantum Optics in Garching and the Ludwig Maximilians University in Munich	more pictures
Theodor Hänsch (* 1941)	physics	2005	(together with John L. Hall ) for his contribution to the development of laser-based precision spectroscopy, with the help of which the color of the light from atoms and molecules can be determined with extreme precision.	LMU	In 1986 Hänsch became director and scientific member of the Max Planck Institute for Quantum Optics and professor at the Ludwig Maximilians University in Munich.	more pictures
Gerhard Ertl (* 1936)	chemistry	2007	for his "studies of chemical processes on solid surfaces"	LMU	1958–59 studies at the Ludwig Maximilians University in Munich. In 1962 Gerhard Ertl went to Munich with Heinz Gerischer, who had accepted a professorship there at the Technical University, and worked there until 1965. From 1973 to 1986, Ertl researched and taught at the LMU as a professor of physical chemistry and achieved important results during this time Results of his research, which was awarded the Nobel Prize.	more pictures

Web links

• Nobel laureate from LMU Munich
• Nobel laureate TU Munich
• Bernhard Fritscher, Nobel Prize Winner, in: Historisches Lexikon Bayerns
• Nobel Prize Committee database