Wolfgang Böhm (agricultural scientist)

Wolfgang Böhm (born July 19, 1936 in Brünlos ) is a German agricultural scientist .

As a university lecturer for plant cultivation at the Georg-August-Universität Göttingen , he has emerged primarily with work on root ecology and the history of science in his field. He has also edited anthologies of well-known poets and published his own poems.

Live and act

Wolfgang Böhm, son of an Erzgebirge community official, obtained his secondary school leaving certificate in 1953 at the Hanover City Boys' Middle School, then completed an apprenticeship as a chemical laboratory assistant and then worked in a research laboratory of a chemical company in Seelze. After obtaining his university entrance qualification, he began a broad-based study of natural sciences in 1965 at the Georg-August University in Göttingen , majoring in geography. In 1969 he passed the state examination with a written thesis on the life's work of the Göttingen geographer Hermann Wagner .

In 1970 Böhm began a second degree at the Agricultural Faculty of the University of Göttingen. In 1971 he got a job as a research assistant at the Institute for Plant Cultivation and Plant Breeding. Under the aegis of Kord Baeumer , he received his doctorate there in 1973 with a thesis on the problems of phosphate fertilization and root growth in cereals. The root ecology, but above all the investigation methods of the root growth of agricultural crops, were the focus of his research in Göttingen in the following years. In 1975, on the occasion of a research stay at Iowa State University in Ames (USA), he developed the plan to develop an interdisciplinary method manual for root examinations. He implemented this project within four years: his Methods of Studying Root Systems , published for the first time in 1979, was considered the authoritative international standard work in the field of root ecology for two decades.

Böhm, who completed his habilitation in 1980 and was appointed adjunct professor in 1985, worked at the Göttingen Chair for Crop Production until 1997. During the last fifteen years of his university service, he mainly dealt with questions about the scientific history of crop production. He published most of the research results in the "Zeitschrift für Acker- und Pflanzenbau", in "Reports about Agriculture" and in the "Zeitschrift für Agrargeschichte und Agrarsoziologie". Of the book publications, his Biographical Handbook for the History of Plant Cultivation (1997) is now one of the most important works in the field of agricultural biographies. Böhm has been heavily involved in the Society for Crop Science since 1980 . From 1991 to 2005 he headed the "Working Group for the History of Science of Plant Cultivation" of this specialist society.

As a friend of classical poetry, Böhm has published anthologies of poetry, including bibliophile volumes with poems by Eduard Mörike , Joseph von Eichendorff and Johann Wolfgang von Goethe . In addition, he published his own humorous verses about the very human behavior of small and large actors in academic teaching and research.

Publications (selection)

• Investigations into phosphate fertilization and root growth of grain in the arable farming system without tillage . Diss. Agr. Göttingen 1973. U 73.6168
• Methods of Studying Root Systems . (Ecological Studies Vol. 33), Springer-Verlag Berlin, Heidelberg and New York 1979. Reprints 1983 and 1985. Edition in Polish, Warszawa 1985.
• Plant cultivation scientist from Göttingen. A bibliography . Publishing house I. Maier-Ruppert Regensburg 1988.
• Introduction to the history of science in crop production . Triade-Verlag E. Claupein Göttingen 1990.
• Aims and ways of research in crop production. Festschrift for Kord Baeumer on his 65th birthday . Edited by Wolfgang Böhm. Triade-Verlag E. Claupein Göttingen 1991
• A life for crop science. Festschrift for Eduard von Boguslawski on his 90th birthday on December 30, 1995 . Edited by Wolfgang Böhm and Martin Zoschke . Publishing house Adelheid Böhm Göttingen 1995.
• Ewald Wollny . Pioneer for a new view of crop production . Publishing house Adelheid Böhm Göttingen 1996.
• Contributions to the scientific understanding of crop production. A bibliographic guide . Publishing house Adelheid Böhm Göttingen 1996.
• Biographical handbook on the history of crop production , KG Saur Verlag Munich 1997.
• Poetry and Agriculture. Masterpieces from a bygone era . Edited by Wolfgang Böhm. Auretim Verlag Göttingen 2003, 2nd edition ibid. 2004.
• The global professor. Poems . Auretim Verlag Göttingen 2005.

literature

• Kürschner's German Scholars Calendar 2007. Bio-bibliographical directory of contemporary German-speaking scientists . 21st edition, KG Saur Verlag, Munich 2007, Vol. I, p. 322.
• Kürschner's German Literature Calendar 2006/2007 . 65th year, KG Saur Verlag, Munich and Leipzig 2007, Vol. I, pp. 112–113.
• Harry Knittel: The working group for the history of science in crop production . In: Society for Crop Science 1956–2006. Festschrift for the 50th anniversary. Englram & Partner, Haßloch 2007, pp. 139–141 (with picture).

Web links

• Literature by and about Wolfgang Böhm in the catalog of the German National Library