Hermann Niemeyer Fernández (26 October 1918 – 7 June 1991) was a well-known Chilean scientist he did much to establish biochemistry as a research discipline in Chile. In 1983 he received the
National Science Prize[
] for his major advances in biochemistry in the fields of bioenergetics, metabolic regulation of enzymes, and studies of metabolism in liver cells.
Life and career
Education
Hermann Niemeyer was born in
Ovalle
Ovalle is a city in the Coquimbo Region of Chile, founded in 1831 as a settlement. It has a population of more than 113,000 people. The name Ovalle was chosen to honor to Chile's vice-president, José Tomás Ovalle. Ovalle is the capital of the ...
, Chile, where his father was the German consul. His secondary education was at the
Internado Nacional Barros Arana
The Internado Nacional Barros Arana (INBA), also known by its code A-17, is a high school located in Santiago, Chile, particularly in front of Quinta Normal Park. It began its operations independently on 20 May 1902, under the presidency of Germà ...
in Santiago, where he joined an exceptional group of young people, including
Jorge Millas ">sand
Nicanor Parra
Nicanor Segundo Parra Sandoval (5 September 1914 – 23 January 2018) was a Chilean poet and physicist. He was considered one of the most influential Chilean poets of the Spanish language in the 20th century, often compared with Pablo Neruda. P ...
(brother of
Violeta Parra
Violeta del Carmen Parra Sandoval (; 4 October 1917 – 5 February 1967) was a Chilean composer, singer-songwriter, folklorist, ethnomusicologist and visual artist. She pioneered the Nueva Canción Chilena (The Chilean New Song), a renewal and ...
). Membership of this group, illustrated at a web page about Nicanor Parra that has a photograph that includes Niemeyer as a young man (easily recognizable to those who knew him as an old man), marked Niemeyer's character: his preference for frank and rigorous discussion; his humanism; his liking of music and painting; and his strictly republican politics.
In 1943 he obtained the title of Doctor of Surgery for his thesis ''Contribución al estudio del metabolismo de la célula hepática'' (''Contribution to the study of metabolism in the liver cell'').
Postgraduate research
For a few years Niemeyer worked in paediatrics, and moved later to biochemistry. From 1944 until 1953 he published a series of reports on malnutrition, some of them drawing on his biochemical experience, written with
Julio Meneghello Rivera.
In the same period he published more strictly biochemical work with
Eduardo Cruz-Coke
Eduardo Cruz-Coke Lassabe (April 22, 1899 – March 18, 1974) was a Chilean political figure, the conservative candidate in Chile's 1946 presidential election and the principal creator of the Chilean health system.
Cruz-Coke was born in Valp ...
.
In 1949 Niemeyer obtained a
Guggenheim research fellowship to work in the Department of Biochemistry at
Harvard
Harvard University is a private Ivy League research university in Cambridge, Massachusetts. Founded in 1636 as Harvard College and named for its first benefactor, the Puritan clergyman John Harvard, it is the oldest institution of higher le ...
. There he dedicated himself exclusively to research rather than paediatrics. He returned to the USA in 1957 to work at the
University of Wisconsin
A university () is an institution of higher (or tertiary) education and research which awards academic degrees in several academic disciplines. Universities typically offer both undergraduate and postgraduate programs. In the United States, t ...
at Madison, where he worked with
Van Rensselaer Potter
Van Rensselaer Potter II (August 27, 1911 – September 6, 2001) was an American biochemist, oncologist, and bioethicist. Born in northeast South Dakota, Potter was professor of oncology at the McArdle Laboratory for Cancer Research at the ...
.
Career
In his later years Niemeyer was Professor of Biochemistry of the University of Chile, with his research group in the
Faculty of Sciences
Science education is the teaching and learning of science to school children, college students, or adults within the general public. The field of science education includes work in science content, science process (the scientific method), some ...
, where he worked on enzymes of liver metabolism, especially liver
hexokinase
A hexokinase is an enzyme that phosphorylates hexoses (six-carbon sugars), forming hexose phosphate. In most organisms, glucose is the most important substrate for hexokinases, and glucose-6-phosphate is the most important product. Hexokina ...
. He was the first to report that this enzyme, monomeric in structure, displayed sigmoidal kinetics with respect to its substrate, glucose, a property previously thought to require multiple subunits.
In 1988 he was one of the founders of the political movement ''
Independents for a Democratic Consensus''.
An account of Niemeyer's career has been given by the Spanish Society for Biochemistry and Molecular Biology (SEBBM).
Death
Niemeyer died in
Santiago
Santiago (, ; ), also known as Santiago de Chile, is the capital and largest city of Chile as well as one of the largest cities in the Americas. It is the center of Chile's most densely populated region, the Santiago Metropolitan Region, whose ...
, Chile, on 7 June 1991
Prizes and distinctions
In 1952 he and Julio Meneghello were awarded the Nestlé Prize for their work on infantile malnutrition. In 1962 he earned the
Atenea Award
The Atena Award ( es, Premio Atenea, links=no) is an honor given by the journal ''Atenea'', published by the University of Concepción, Chile.
The award was given for the first time in 1929, granted annually to the most outstanding book of the yea ...
for his textbook ''BioquÃmica General'' (''General Biochemistry''). The Academy of Sciences of the
Instituto de Chile elected him as full member in 1971, assigning seat N° 9 to him. The Argentinian Society for Biochemical Research (SAIB: Sociedad Argentina de Investigaciones BioquÃmicas) made him an Honorary Member in 1972, and in 1981 he received the corresponding status of the Chilean Society of Biology (Sociedad de BiologÃa de Chile) and of the Chilean Society of Biochemistry (Sociedad de BioquÃmica de Chile). In 1983 he was awarded the
National Science Prize. Towards the end of his life, in 1990, the University of Chile awarded him the Medalla Juvenal Hernández Jaque. The Spanish Society of Biochemistry and Molecular Biology (SEBBM) has an annual lecture to commemorate Hermann Niemeyer.
[
]
References
{{DEFAULTSORT:Niemeyer, Hermann
1918 births
1991 deaths
Chilean biochemists
Chilean scientists
Members of the Chilean Academy of Sciences