Hans Walter Kosterlitz
FRS (27 April 1903 – 26 October 1996) was a
German
German(s) may refer to:
* Germany (of or related to)
** Germania (historical use)
* Germans, citizens of Germany, people of German ancestry, or native speakers of the German language
** For citizens of Germany, see also German nationality law
**Ge ...
-born British biochemist.
Biography
Hans Walter Kosterlitz was born on 27 April 1903 in Berlin. He was the elder son of Bernhard Kosterlitz, a physician, and Selma Helena Lepman.
Kosterlitz’s father had recommended a career in law. He gave it a try for six months at the University of Berlin, but then switched to medicine. He graduated in 1928 and worked in the department of
Wilhelm His. From 1930-33 he was an assistant at the
Charité hospital, University of Berlin, where he worked in the radiology department. His daytime job in clinical radiology funded his evening researches in the laboratory, where he developed an interest in carbohydrate metabolism.
In 1933 Adolf Hitler passed the
Law for the Restoration of the Professional Civil Service, which applied to non-Aryans. Later a similar law was passed to cover all lawyers, doctors and other professions. Kosterlitz, who had Jewish ancestry, contacted
John Macleod, FRS in Aberdeen, who managed to accumulate some modest funding, sufficient for him to reply ‘come to Aberdeen … but no guarantee of a secure job’.
[ Kosterlitz arrived the following March.
Soon after Macleod’s untimely death on 16 March 1935, Kosterlitz was awarded the first ever project grant (£50) from the newly-founded Diabetic Association. He later received his first grant from the ]MRC
MRC may refer to
Government
* Medical Research Council (United Kingdom)
* Medical Reserve Corps, a US network of volunteer organizations
* Municipalité régionale de comté (regional county municipality), Quebec, Canada
* Military Revolutionar ...
.
On 9 March 1937 he married Johanna Maria Katharina Greßhöner, known as Hanna, a friend from Berlin who had arrived in Scotland in 1935. Both Kosterlitz parents and their younger son Rolf moved to the UK in 1939, and lived at 110b Banbury Road, Oxford. The 1939 National Register shows Bernhard as a medical referee for an insurance company. Hans and Hanna had a son, John Michael, now Professor of Physics at Brown University, who wo
the Nobel Prize in Physics in 2016
Over the years Hans Kosterlitz was a Carnegie Teaching Fellow, Lecturer, Senior Lecturer, and finally Reader. In 1968, Aberdeen established a new Department of Pharmacology, which was headed by Kosterlitz as professor until 1973, when he became director of the university's drug addiction research unit.
Kosterlitz is best known for his work as one of the key discoverers of endorphin
Endorphins (contracted from endogenous morphine) are chemical signals in the brain that block the perception of pain and increase feelings of wellbeing. They are produced and stored in an area of the brain known as the pituitary gland.
Hist ...
s. He stimulated the mouse isolated vas deferens
The vas deferens or ductus deferens is part of the male reproductive system of many vertebrates. The ducts transport sperm from the epididymis to the ejaculatory ducts in anticipation of ejaculation. The vas deferens is a partially coiled tube ...
electrically and recorded its contractions with a polygraph
A polygraph, often incorrectly referred to as a lie detector test, is a device or procedure that measures and records several physiological indicators such as blood pressure, pulse, respiration, and skin conductivity while a person is asked ...
. He then found that if you added opiates to the solution, the muscle would not contract. Opiates inhibited the contraction. Those contractions were later found to resume in the presence of both opiates and an antagonist such as naloxone
Naloxone, sold under the brand names Narcan (4 mg) and Kloxxado (8 mg) among others, is a medication used to reverse or reduce the effects of opioids. It is commonly used to counter decreased breathing in opioid overdose. Effects begin withi ...
. Later, endogenous endorphins were discovered by applying pig brain cell homegenate to the apparatus. This caused the contractions to cease. The degree to which an opiate agonist inhibits contractions of the mouse vas deferens, and other tissues like the guinea pig ileum
The ileum () is the final section of the small intestine in most higher vertebrates, including mammals, reptiles, and birds. In fish, the divisions of the small intestine are not as clear and the terms posterior intestine or distal intestine m ...
, is highly correlated to its potency
Potency may refer to:
* Potency (pharmacology), a measure of the activity of a drug in a biological system
* Virility
* Cell potency, a measure of the differentiation potential of stem cells
* In homeopathic dilutions, potency is a measure of how ...
as an analgesic.
Awards, honours and tribute
*1951 Fellow of the Royal Society of Edinburgh
*1976 Schmiedeberg Plakette, German Pharmacological Society
*1977 Pacesetter award (US National Institute on Drug Abuse)
*1977 Scheele Award
The Scheele Award () is a scientific award given by the Swedish , an organisation mainly consisting of pharmacists. The award is given to commemorate the pharmacist and chemist Carl Wilhelm Scheele (1742–1786) and has been appointed since 1961, i ...
*1978 Fellow of the Royal Society
The Royal Society, formally The Royal Society of London for Improving Natural Knowledge, is a learned society and the United Kingdom's national academy of sciences. The society fulfils a number of roles: promoting science and its benefits, re ...
of London
:Nathan B. Eddy Award
:Albert Lasker Award
The Lasker Awards have been awarded annually since 1945 to living persons who have made major contributions to medical science or who have performed public service on behalf of medicine. They are administered by the Lasker Foundation, which was ...
*1979 Baly Medal
The Baly Medal is a biennial award awarded by the Royal College of Physicians of London.
Founded by a gift from Frederick Daniel Dyster (1809?–93) received in 1866, confirmed by deed 1930 – in memory of William Baly: £400 to provide a gold m ...
, Royal College of Physicians
The Royal College of Physicians (RCP) is a British professional membership body dedicated to improving the practice of medicine, chiefly through the accreditation of physicians by examination. Founded by royal charter from King Henry VIII in 1 ...
:Royal Medal, Royal Society
The Royal Society, formally The Royal Society of London for Improving Natural Knowledge, is a learned society and the United Kingdom's national academy of sciences. The society fulfils a number of roles: promoting science and its benefits, re ...
of London
*1980 MacDougal–Brisbane Prize, Royal Society of Edinburgh
:Honorary membership, British Pharmacological Society
The British Pharmacological Society is the primary UK learned society for pharmacologists concerned with research into drugs and the way they work. Members work in academia, industry, regulatory agencies and the health services, and many are medi ...
*1981 Fellow of the Royal College of Physicians of Edinburgh
The Royal College of Physicians of Edinburgh (RCPE) is a medical royal college in Scotland. It is one of three organisations that sets the specialty training standards for physicians in the United Kingdom. It was established by Royal charter ...
:Feldberg Prize
The Feldberg Foundation promotes scientific exchange between German and British scientists in the field of experimental medical research. The foundation is registered in Hamburg, Germany with the secretariat based in the UK.
The pharmacologist Wi ...
:Harvey Prize, Technion – Israel Institute of Technology
The Technion – Israel Institute of Technology ( he, הטכניון – מכון טכנולוגי לישראל) is a public research university located in Haifa, Israel. Established in 1912 under the dominion of the Ottoman Empire, the Technion ...
*1982 Sherrington Memorial Medal, Royal Society of Medicine
*1983 The Dautrebande Prize, Académie Royale de Médecine de Belgique
*1984 Honorary membership, The Physiological Society
The Physiological Society, founded in 1876, is a learned society for physiologists in the United Kingdom.
History
The Physiological Society was founded in 1876 as a dining society "for mutual benefit and protection" by a group of 19 physiologis ...
*1985 Foreign Associate, National Academy of Sciences
*1987 Wellcome Gold Medal, British Pharmacological Society
*1988 Cameron Prize for Therapeutics of the University of Edinburgh
*2010 The Kosterlitz Centre at the University of Aberdeen, opened on 16 September 2010, is named in his honour.
In his 1998 tribute, former colleague and friend Dr Gordon M Lees said of Kosterlitz
:“ ewas a quiet, rather modest man, who was greatly respected, both as a scientist and as a person of real courage, honour, judgement, polite manners, and inflexible integrity of conduct and consistency of principle.”
References
{{DEFAULTSORT:Kosterlitz, Hans
1903 births
1996 deaths
Fellows of the Royal Society
Alumni of the University of Aberdeen
Academics of the University of Aberdeen
Royal Medal winners
Recipients of the Albert Lasker Award for Basic Medical Research
British biochemists
German emigrants to Scotland
German biochemists
Physicians from Berlin
20th-century British medical doctors
Naturalised citizens of the United Kingdom
Jewish emigrants from Nazi Germany to the United Kingdom
Foreign associates of the National Academy of Sciences
People interned in the Isle of Man during World War II