Rainer Herken

Rainer Herken (born May 24, 1945 in Berlin ; † November 3, 2005 in Göttingen ) was a German anatomist and cell biologist .

Life

Rainer Herken was born in Berlin in 1945 as the son of the pharmacologist Hans Herken and initially studied physics for two semesters at the Technical University there . In 1966 he moved to the medical faculty of the Free University of Berlin . In 1974 he received his license to practice medicine. He then worked as a research assistant at the Institute for Anatomy of the Free University of Berlin, since 1976 in the Collaborative Research Center 29 - Embryonic Development and Differentiation (Embryonic Pharmacology) at the Free University of Berlin. He was particularly concerned with the development of thalidomide malformations. Herken received his doctorate in 1976 with the work Investigations into the problem of the morphogenetic influence of blood pressure on the development of the aortic wall of the chicken . In 1981 he completed his habilitation in anatomy at the Free University of Berlin with the work A light microscopic, histochemical, autoradiographic and electron microscopic investigation of the embryonic development of the mouse from the time of mesoderma formation to somite formation . In 1982 Herken was offered a professorship for histology at the University of Göttingen.

Until his death, Herken was head of the histology department and managing director of the Anatomy Center at the University of Göttingen . He was best known for his electron microscopic research on the structure of the extracellular matrix in capillaries of the developing central nervous system .

In addition, he developed novel didactic concepts for the use of so-called new media in student teaching and also appeared as a co-author of various textbooks. Herken was a member of the supervisory board of IWF Wissen und Medien gGmbH , the Leibniz Institute for Media in Science. Herken was employed as managing director of MEDITÜV for TÜV , an authority in internal health protection (occupational medicine - occupational safety). Reiner Herken was one of the authors for the standard work of medical literature "Textbook Preclinical". Last but not least, he was heavily involved in academic self-government, where he was most recently a member of the Senate of the University of Göttingen.

literature

• David G. Robinson, Ulrich Ehlers, Rainer Herken: Methods of Preparation for Electron Microscopy. An Introduction for the Biomedical Sciences , Springer Heidelberg 1987, ISBN 354017592X

Web links

• Detailed biography of Rainer Herken