Walther Wilbrandt

Walther Wilbrandt (born  January 11, 1907 in Berlin , †  July 25, 1979 in Wohlen near Bern , often Walter Wilbrandt ) was a German - Swiss physiologist and pharmacologist . He worked from 1944 to 1977 as professor and institute director at the University of Bern and from 1972 to 1976 as president of the Swiss Academy of Medical Sciences . For his research, especially in the field of membrane biology , he was accepted into the Leopoldina and awarded the Schmiedeberg plaque .

Life

Walther Wilbrandt was born in Berlin in 1907 as the son of the economist Robert Wilbrandt ; his older brother Hans Wilbrandt became an agricultural scientist. After attending the secondary school in Tübingen , he studied medicine at the universities of Tübingen , Freiburg , Berlin , Vienna and Kiel , where he also obtained his medical doctorate in 1931 . He then worked in 1932/1933 at the Physiological Institute of the University of Basel . After the seizure of power of the NSDAP , he left Germany and went first to the United States , where he worked in the years 1934/1935 with Leonor Michaelis on the Rockefeller Institute in New York and at Rudolf Höber at the University of Pennsylvania worked.

In 1936 Walther Wilbrandt joined the Physiological Institute at the University of Bern as an assistant , where he received his habilitation in physiology in 1940 and subsequently worked as a private lecturer . Five years later he was appointed associate professor and in 1946 full professor and director of the Institute of Pharmacology. In addition, he worked from 1955 to 1957 as dean of the university's medical faculty and from 1972 to 1976 as president of the Swiss Academy of Medical Sciences . In 1977 he retired.

Walther Wilbrandt was married twice, first to Renate Rosenberg, the daughter of the astronomer Hans Rosenberg , and later to Timea Kalman. 1949 he was in Bern , the Swiss citizenship awarded. He died in 1979 in Wohlen near Bern .

Scientific work

As part of his research, Walther Wilbrandt focused in particular on the permeability of biological membranes and the associated membrane transport processes and their influence on the metabolism of cells . He mainly concentrated on the transport of sugars through the membrane of erythrocytes . In addition, he dealt with the regulation of the contraction of the heart muscle by calcium ions and cardiac glycosides .

Awards

Walther Wilbrandt was a member of the German Academy of Sciences Leopoldina from 1962 . The German Pharmacological Society awarded him their highest honor in 1977 with the Schmiedeberg plaque .

literature

• Trends in Pharmacological Sciences. February 1980, pp. VII – X (with short bibliography).
• Harald Reuter : Walther Wilbrandt. 1907-1979. In: Journal of Membrane Biology. ISSN  0022-2631 , Vol. 57, H. 2, June 1980, pp. 83-85, doi: 10.1007 / BF01868993 .
• Erich Heinz: Walther Wildbrandt (1907–1979). In: Reviews of Physiology, Biochemistry and Pharmacology . Vol. 89, 1981, pp. 1-4, doi: 10.1007 / BFb0035263 .
• Wilbrandt, Walther. In: Konrad Löffelholz, Ullrich Trendelenburg : Persecuted German-speaking pharmacologists 1933–1945. Dr. Schrör Verlag, Frechen 2008, ISBN 3-9806004-8-3 , p. 140.
• Wilbrandt, Walther. In: Walther Killy (Ed.): Dictionary of German Biography. Volume 10: Thibaut-Zycha. K. G. Saur Verlag, Munich 2006, ISBN 3-11-096116-4 , p. 519.

Web links

• Urs Boschung : Wilbrandt, Walther. In: Historical Lexicon of Switzerland .
• Member entry by Walter Wilbrandt at the German Academy of Sciences Leopoldina , accessed on September 24, 2017.