Volker Erdmann

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Volker Alfred Erdmann (born February 8, 1941 in Stettin ; † September 11, 2015 ) was a German biochemist .

Life

Erdmann studied from 1958 to 1966 at the University of New Hampshire and graduated in 1963 with a bachelor's degree in chemistry and 1966 with a master's degree in biochemistry. From 1966 to 1968 he did research for his doctorate at the Max Planck Institute for Experimental Medicine in Göttingen . In 1968 he received his PhD in biochemistry with minor subjects in chemistry and microbiology at the Technical University of Braunschweig. rer. nat. PhD . After a year as a postdoctoral fellow with Friedrich Cramer at the MPI for Experimental Medicine, Erdmann became a two year postdoctoral fellow with Masayasu Nomura at the University of Wisconsin in Madison, Wisconsin. He then returned to Berlin to the Max Planck Institute for Molecular Genetics , where he was working group leader (C3 position) in Heinz-Günter Wittmann's department from 1971 to 1980 . In 1978 he completed his habilitation in biochemistry at the Free University of Berlin .

In 1980 he accepted the call to a C4 professorship for biochemistry and molecular biology at the Free University of Berlin, where he has worked since then. At the FU he was managing director of the Institute for Biochemistry and also dean of the chemistry department on several occasions. In 1990 he was the founder and until 1999 the spokesman of the Collaborative Research Center 344 “Regulatory Structures of Nucleic Acids and Proteins”. In 1988 he was appointed to a professorship at the Center of Marine Biotechnology at the University of Maryland in Baltimore / USA, and in 1994 he was appointed director of the same institute. However, he declined both appeals.

In 1987 he and Wolfram Saenger (also FU Berlin) received the Gottfried Wilhelm Leibniz Prize of the DFG, the most highly endowed German research prize.

research

Erdmann mainly dealt with the biochemistry of ribonucleic acids (RNA) and the possible use of RNA for biomedical and gene therapy purposes. One focus was RNA interference technology, others were cell-free protein synthesis and aptamers . For the crystallization of nucleic acids, some experiments were carried out under conditions of microgravity in space. Erdmann has submitted over 400 publications.

Honors and offices

  • 1997 founder of the interdisciplinary research association "RNA technologies"
  • Member of the Berlin-Brandenburg Academy of Sciences and the Polish Academy of Sciences .
  • CEO of RiNA e. V. (RNA network)
  • Founder of RiNA GmbH
  • Chairman of the Scientific Advisory Board of NOXXON Pharma AG
  • Member of the Board of Trustees of the Max Planck Institute for Molecular Genetics
  • Member of the Board of Trustees of the Wernher von Braun Foundation
  • Member of numerous award commissions and expert committees (including Ernst Reuter Society, Otto Klung Weber Bank Prize, Biofutur Prize (BMBF))

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Volker Erdmann passed away. Free University of Berlin, September 14, 2015, accessed on July 3, 2017 .
personal data
SURNAME Erdmann, Volker
ALTERNATIVE NAMES Erdmann, Volker Alfred
BRIEF DESCRIPTION German university professor, professor of biochemistry
DATE OF BIRTH February 8, 1941
PLACE OF BIRTH Szczecin
DATE OF DEATH September 11, 2015