Otto Ludwig Lange

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Otto Ludwig Lange (born August 21, 1927 in Dortmund ; † August 14, 2017 in Würzburg ) was a German biologist and botanist . The focus of his scientific work was on the ecophysiology of wild and cultivated plants as well as lichens ( lichenes ). Its official botanical author abbreviation is " OLLange ".

Life

Otto L. Lange studied biology, chemistry and physics at the Universities of Freiburg and Göttingen . The latter was followed in 1952 by the state examination for teaching at secondary schools as well as the doctorate and in 1959 the habilitation in botany. From 1961 to 1963 he was a scientific advisor at the TU Darmstadt . From 1963 to 1967 he held the chair for forest botany and technical mycology at the University of Göttingen and was responsible for the forest botanical garden there. Otto Ludwig Lange was Professor of Botany at the University of Würzburg from 1967 onwards , he turned down calls to Grenoble , Stuttgart-Hohenheim , Tübingen and Göttingen and retired in 1992. In Würzburg he also managed the botanical garden and looked after its refurbishment after it was moved out of the city center.

He was with the biologist Rose, geb. Wilhelm, married, they have two daughters. Lange died in August 2017 a few days before his 90th birthday in Würzburg.

Act

Teaching

Lange taught general botany, forest botany, forest genetics, plant systematics, general ecology, ecophysiology, vegetation and plant sociology at the universities of Göttingen, Darmstadt and Würzburg. He carried out identification exercises for higher plants, mosses, fungi and lichens, experimental internships and excursions. He has taught as visiting scholar at universities in the United States, Australia, and China.

Research work

The aim of Lange's ecological-botanical research was to quantitatively record the behavior and reactions of wild and cultivated plants, as well as of lichens in their outdoor locations in the interplay with their environment. Possibility of existence, distribution and productivity as a result of their morphological properties and their physiological functions should be analyzed and causally interpreted. The water balance and photosynthetic carbon gain were the focus of interest. A constant change between measurements and experiments in the field and working under controlled conditions in the laboratory, for example in climatic chambers, was characteristic of such ecophysiological investigations. Lange's research focused on plants and lichens in extreme growth areas, where adaptations to drought, cold or heat are particularly evident, from the Antarctic to the tropical rainforest in Panama. His investigations were on the one hand basic research; on the other hand, applied aspects were in the foreground, such as irrigation cultures in desert areas (e.g. in the Negev desert in Israel), work on forest damage caused by air pollutants or the analysis of “ biological soil crusts ” as protection against erosion in arid areas. Exact ecophysiological metabolic measurements on plants under field conditions require a specially designed measurement method. Lange tried to construct it. Mobile field laboratories have been set up to continuously record photosynthesis and transpiration in plants. In cooperation with specialist companies and workshops, special instruments, e.g. B. developed air-conditioned cuvettes and "porometers" to determine gas exchange and diffusion resistance of plants.

Lange has published nearly 400 scientific articles. He is the first to describe the lichen species Gonohymenia mauritanica LANGE 1958 syn. Lichinella mauritanica (LONG) MOENO et EGEA.

Science organization

Otto L. Lange worked as editor and co-editor of botanical journals (Photosynthetica, Oecologia, Flora, Biochemie und Physiologie der Pflanzen, Trees, Botanica Acta), book series (Ecological Studies, Man and the Biosphere) and specialist books (e.g. 4 volumes of the Encyclopedia of Plant Physiology: Physiological Plant Ecology, Springer-Verlag 1981-1983).

He was u. a. active in the following scientific bodies:

  • 1976–1981: "Board of Trustees of the Academy for Nature Conservation and Landscape Management", Munich / Laufen
  • 1981–1988: Founder and spokesman of the Würzburg DFG research group "Ecophysiology"
  • 1982–1989: Founding member and advisory board member of the “Bavarian Forest Toxicology Research Group” of the Bavarian State Ministry for Education and Culture
  • 1987–1990: Chairman of the "Arid Ecosystems Research Center" of the Hebrew University Jerusalem (Israel)
  • 1989–1991: Speaker of the DFG Collaborative Research Center 251 at the University of Würzburg "Ecology, Physiology and Biochemistry of Plant Performance under Stress"

honors and awards

Namesake

The lichen species Peltula langei BÜDEL and ELIX 1997, Hubbsia langei FOLLMANN 1997 and Jackelixia ottolangei SYKONDR., KÄRNEFELT and V.WIRTH 2010 were named after Otto Ludwig Lange .

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Obituary in the Mainpost from August 17, 2017, accessed on August 17, 2017.
  2. ↑ Member entry by Otto L. Lange (with picture and CV) at the German Academy of Natural Scientists Leopoldina , accessed on February 18, 2016.
  3. ↑ Member entry by Prof. Dr. Otto Ludwig Lange (with picture) at the Bavarian Academy of Sciences , accessed on February 18, 2016.
  4. ↑ List of all Leibniz Prize winners at the DFG ( Memento from September 26, 2007 in the Internet Archive ) (PDF, 237 kB)
  5. ↑ Note at balzan.it ( Memento from June 5, 2006 in the Internet Archive )
  6. ↑ Laudation for the Acharius Medal
  7. ↑ Laudation German Botanical Society for honorary membership 2002
personal data
SURNAME Lange, Otto Ludwig
BRIEF DESCRIPTION German biologist
DATE OF BIRTH August 21, 1927
PLACE OF BIRTH Dortmund
DATE OF DEATH August 14, 2017
Place of death Wurzburg