Ludwig Haberlandt (1 February 1885 – 22 July 1932) is known as a father of
hormonal contraception
Hormonal contraception refers to birth control methods that act on the endocrine system. Almost all methods are composed of steroid hormones, although in India one selective estrogen receptor modulator is marketed as a contraceptive. The origin ...
. In 1921 he carried out experiments on rabbits and he demonstrated a temporary hormonal contraception in a female by transplanting ovaries from a second, pregnant, animal.
His father was the eminent botanist,
Gottlieb Haberlandt
Gottlieb Haberlandt (28 November 1854 – 30 January 1945) was an Austrian botanist. He was the son of European 'soybean' pioneer Professor Friedrich J. Haberlandt. His son Ludwig Haberlandt was an early reproductive physiologist now given credit ...
,
plant tissue culture
Plant tissue culture is a collection of techniques used to maintain or grow plant cells, tissues or organs under sterile conditions on a nutrient culture medium of known composition. It is widely used to produce clones of a plant in a method known ...
theorist and visionary; his grandfather was the European 'soybean' pioneer and trailblazer
Friedrich J. Haberlandt Friedrich J. Haberlandt (1826–1878) was a professor of agriculture at the ''Hochschule fuer Bodenkultur'' ( Royal College of Agriculture) in Vienna, Austria-Hungary. He is best known for his book ''Die Sojabohne'' (The Soybean, 1878), which introd ...
.
In 1930 he began clinical trials after successful production of a hormonal preparation, Infecundin®, by the
G. Richter Company in Budapest, Hungary. He ended his 1931 book, ''Die hormonale Sterilisierung des weiblichen Organismus'', with a visionary claim: 'Unquestionably, practical application of the temporary hormonal sterilization in women would markedly contribute to the ideal in human society already enunciated a generation earlier by
Sigmund Freud
Sigmund Freud ( , ; born Sigismund Schlomo Freud; 6 May 1856 – 23 September 1939) was an Austrian neurologist and the founder of psychoanalysis, a clinical method for evaluating and treating psychopathology, pathologies explained as originatin ...
(1898). Theoretically, one of the greatest triumphs of mankind would be the elevation of procreation into a voluntary and deliberate act.' He was hounded for his views on reproductive biology up to his death from either suicide, or heart attack.
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Austrian scientists
1885 births
1932 suicides
1932 deaths
Suicides in Austria
Hormonal contraception
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