Genetics as a Modernization Program: Biological Research at the Kaiser Wilhelm Institutes and the Political Economy of the Nazi State

Historical Studies in the Natural Sciences (2010) 40 (4): 429–456.

https://doi.org/10.1525/hsns.2010.40.4.429

During the Third Reich, the biological institutes of the Kaiser Wilhelm Society (KWG, Kaiser-Wilhelm-Gesellschaft) underwent a substantial reorganization and modernization. This paper discusses the development of projects in the fields of biochemical genetics, virus research, radiation genetics, and plant genetics that were initiated in those years. These cases exemplify, on the one hand, the political conditions for biological research in the Nazi state. They highlight how leading scientists advanced their projects by building close ties with politicians and science-funding organizations and companies. On the other hand, the study examines how the contents of research were shaped by, and how they contributed to, the aims and needs of the political economy of the Nazi system. This paper therefore aims not only to highlight basic aspects of scientific development under Nazism, but also to provide general insights into the structure of the Third Reich and the dynamics of its war economy.

Keywords:

National Socialism, Kaiser Wilhelm Society, biology, genetics, virus research, Adolf Butenandt, Fritz von Wettstein, Nikolai Timoféeff-Ressovsky, Alfred Kühn

International control of chemical and biological weapons

1675—Strasbourg Treaty: Germany and France agree on banning the use of poisons in warfare, i.e. the contamination of water supplies, food or weapons.

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Freis, David2018-07-01After his abdication in November 1918, the German emperor Wilhelm II continued to haunt the minds of his people. With the abolition of the lese-majesty laws in the new republic, many topics that were only discussed privately or obliquely before could now be broached openly. One of these topics was the mental state of the exiled Kaiser. Numerous psychiatrists, physicians and laypeople published their diagnoses of Wilhelm in high-circulation newspaper articles, pamphlets, and books shortly after the end of the war. Whether these diagnoses were accurate and whether the Kaiser really was mentally ill became the issue of a heated debate.This article situates these diagnoses of Wilhelm II in their political context. The authors of these diagnoses – none of whom had met or examined Wilhelm II in person – came from all political camps and they wrote with very different motives in mind. Diagnosing the exiled Kaiser as mentally ill was a kind of exorcism of the Hohenzollern rule, opening the way for either a socialist republic or the hoped-for rule of a new leader. But more importantly, it was a way to discuss and allocate political responsibility and culpability. Psychiatric diagnoses were used to exonerate both the Emperor (for whom the treaty of Versailles provided a tribunal as war criminal) and the German nation. They were also used to blame the Kaiser’s entourage and groups that had allegedly manipulated the weak-willed monarch. Medical concepts became a vehicle for a debate on the key political questions in interwar Germany.

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Sachse, Carola2011-01-01The Max Planck Institute for Molecular Genetics (MPIMG) in Berlin-Dahlem dates its establishment to 1964. Its homepage makes no mention of its predecessor institutes, the Kaiser Wilhelm Institute for Anthropology, Human Genetics and Eugenics (KWIA) and the subsequent MPI for Comparative Genetics and Hereditary Pathology (MPIVEE). This article traces the two critical phases of transition regarding the constellations of academic staff, institutional and epistemic ruptures and continuities specific to the era. Only one of the five department heads from the final war years, Hans Nachtsheim, remained a researcher within the Max Planck Society (MPG); he nevertheless continued to advocate the pre-war and wartime eugenic agenda in the life sciences and social policy. The generational change of 1959/60 became a massive struggle within the institute, in which microbial genetics (with Fritz Kaudewitz) was pitted against human genetics (with Friedrich Vogel) and managed to establish itself after a fresh change in personnel in 1964/65. For the Dahlem institute, this involved a far-reaching reorientation of its research, but for the genetically oriented life sciences in the Max Planck Society as a whole it only meant that molecular biology, which was already being pursued in the West German institutes, gained an additional facility. With this realignment of research traditions, the Society was able to draw a line under the Nazi past without having to address it head-on.

The historical development of modern virus research in Germany, especially in the Kaiser-Wilhelm-/Max-Planck-Society, 1936–1954.PubMed

Butenandt, A1977-01-01This is lecture on the historical development of modern virus research in Germany to introduce a symposium dedicated to Prof. Werner SchÃ¤fer, TÃ¼bingen, on the occasion of his 65th birthday. The author was set the task of relating from his memories the beginning of modern virus research in Germany. This research has, since 1936, essentially taken place in the Kaiser-Wilhelm/Max-Planck-Society and in 1954 led to the founding of the Max-Planck-Institute for Virus Research in TÃ¼bingen, an institute which to the present day owes its scientific reputation in considerable part to the activity of Werner SchÃ¤fer. Since the author personally experienced and participated in the Institute’s development from 1936-1954, his remarks are predominantly influenced by personal recollections, which have been sharpended by a renewed study of old records in the ‚Library and Archive of the History of the Max-Planck-Gesellschaft‘, Berlin-Dahlem.

Human heredity and politics: A comparative institutionalstudy of the Eugenics Record Office at Cold Spring Harbor (United States), the Kaiser Wilhelm Institute for Anthropology, Human Heredity, and Eugenics (Germany), and the Maxim Gorky Medical Genetics Institute (USSR).PubMed

Adams, Mark B; Allen, Garland E; Weiss, Sheila Faith2005-01-01Despite the fact that much has been written in recent years about the science of heredity under the Third Reich, there is as yet no satisfying analysis of two central questions: What, if anything, was peculiarly „Nazi“ about human genetics under National Socialism? How, under whatever set of causes, did at least some of Germany’s most well-known and leading biomedical practioners become engaged in entgrenzte Wissenschaft (science without moral boundaries)? This paper attempts to provide some answers to these two questions comparing three institutes that studied eugenics and human heredity in the 1920s and 1930s: the Eugenics Record Office at Cold Spring Harbor, New York, directed by Charles B. Davenport; the Kaiser Wilhelm Institute for Anthropology, Human Heredity and Eugenics, in Berlin, directed by Eugen Fischer; and the Maxim Gorky Medical Genetics Institute in Moscow, directed by Solomon G. Levit. The institutes are compared on the basis of the kind and quality of their research in eugenics and medical genetics, organizational structure, leadership, patronage (private or state), and the economic-social-political context in which they functioned.

[The history of the Kaiser Wilhelm Society during the Third Reich. Interim reports of the president’s commission of the Max Planck Society].PubMed

Weber, M M2002-11-01In 1997 the Max Planck Society set up a presidential commission to do research on the historical development of its precursor organization, the Kaiser Wilhelm Society (KWG), during the Third Reich. This paper presents some of the important results given in the interim reports of this commission that are relevant to psychiatry. It focuses on brain research, anthropology, psychiatric genetics, and the role of the well-known biochemist Adolf Butenandt. In general, the interim reports reflect the numerous links between the biomedical research of the KWG and the institutions of the National Socialist (Nazi) state. However, they do not yet allow a final historical assessment as to the complex situation of this field of research during National Socialism.

Neuropathological research at the „Deutsche Forschungsanstalt fuer Psychiatrie“ (German Institute for Psychiatric Research) in Munich (Kaiser-Wilhelm-Institute). Scientific utilization of children’s organs from the „Kinderfachabteilungen“ (Children’s Special Departments) at Bavarian State Hospitals.PubMed

Steger, Florian2006-09-01During National Socialism, the politically motivated interest in psychiatric genetic research lead to the founding of research departments specialized in pathological-anatomical brain research, the two KaiserWilhelm-Institutes (KWI) in Berlin and Munich. The latter was indirectly provided with brain material by Bavarian State Hospitals, to three of which „Kinderfachabteilungen“ (Special Pediatric Units) were affiliated. As children became victims of the systematically conducted child „euthanasia“ in these Special Pediatric Units, this paper will address the question whether and to which extent the organs from victims of child „euthanasia“ were used for (neuro-) pathological research at the KWI in Munich. By means of case studies and medical histories (with focus on the situation in Kaufbeuren-Irsee), I will argue that pediatric departments on a regular base delivered slide preparations, that the child „euthanasia“ conduced in these departments systematically contributed to neuropathological research and that slide preparations from victims of child „euthanasia“ were used in scientific publications after 1945.

Human genetics and politics as mutually beneficial resources: The case of the Kaiser Wilhelm Institute for Anthropology, Human Heredity and Eugenics during the Third Reich.PubMed

Weiss, Sheila Faith2006-01-01This essay analyzes one of Germany’s former premier research institutions for biomedical research, the KaiserWilhelm Institute for Anthropology, Human Heredity and Eugenics (KWIA) as a test case for the way in which politics and human heredity served as resources for each other during the Third Reich. Examining the KWIA from this perspective brings us a step closer to answering the questions at the heart of most recent scholarship concerning the biomedical community under the swastika: (1) How do we explain why the vast majority of German human geneticists and eugenicists were willing to work for the National Socialist state and, at the very least, legitimized its exterminationist racial policy; and (2) what accounts for at least some of Germany’s most renowned medically trained professionals‘ involvement in forms of morally compromised science that wholly transcend the bounds of normal scientific practice? Although a complete answer to this question must await an examination of other German biological research centers, the present study suggests that during the Nazi period the symbiotic relationship between human genetics and politics served to radicalize both. The dynamic between the science of human heredity and Nazi politics changed the research practice of some of the biomedical sciences housed at the KWIA. It also simultaneously made it easier for the Nazi state to carry out its barbaric racial program leading, finally, to the extermination of millions of so-called racial undesirables.

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Schneck, P1984-01-01The paper gives a bioergographical survey on the German obstetrician and gynaecologist Wilhelm Liepmann. He was Ass. Professor at the Berlin university. Later he became director of the German Women-Institute, which was founded by the Hauptverband der Krankenkassen. In 1933 Liepmann had to emigrate to Turkey, where he got the chair of gynaecology at the university of Istanbul.

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Friedrich, Bretislav; Hoffmann, Dieter; James, Jeremiah2011-10-17We outline the institutional history and highlight aspects of the scientific history of the Fritz Haber Institute (FHI) of the Max Planck Society, successor to the Kaiser WilhelmInstitute for Physical Chemistry and Electrochemistry, from its founding in 1911 until about the turn of the 21st century. Established as one of the first two Kaiser WilhelmInstitutes, the Institute began as a much-awaited remedy for what prominent German chemists warned was the waning of Germany’s scientific and technological superiority relative to the United States and to other European nations. The history of the Institute has largely paralleled that of 20th century Germany. It spearheaded the research and development of chemical weapons during World War I, then experienced a „golden era“ during the 1920s and early 1930s, in spite of financial hardships. Under the National Socialists it suffered a purge of its scientific staff and a diversion of its research into the service of the new regime, accompanied by a breakdown in its international relations. In the immediate aftermath of World War II it suffered crippling material losses, from which it recovered slowly in the postwar era. In 1952, the Institute took the name of its founding director and the following year joined the fledgling Max Planck Society, successor to the Kaiser Wilhelm Society. During the 1950s and 1960s, the Institute supported diverse research into the structure of matter and electron microscopy in its geographically isolated and politically precarious location in West Berlin. In subsequent decades, as Berlin benefited from the policies of dÃ©tente and later glasnost and the Max Planck Society continued to reassess its preferred model of a research institute, the FHI reorganized around a board of coequal scientific directors and renewed its focus on the investigation of elementary processes on surfaces and interfaces, topics of research that had been central to the work of Fritz Haber and the first „golden era“ of

Kaiser captures spirit of games.PubMed

Herreria, J1998-01-01 With a multi-media campaign, Kaiser Permanente blitzed its market area by becoming a sponsor of the Nike World Masters Games. The advertising campaign promoted Kaiser as the exclusive health care sponsor. Company officials are counting on this campaign to leverage the health care institution’s commitment to the community. In addition to the advertising, Kaiser searched for local athletes to represent its „play the sports for life“ theme. As part of a promotion to award 200 athlete sponsorships to the Games, Kaiser’s own master athletes were invited to tell their stories. Some of the members shared stories about such topics as experiencing an accident, receiving assistance from a Kaiser physician and incorporating a lifestyle of sport for rehabilitation. From the hundreds of letters received, two members and one employee were selected for the television spots. The sporting event reinforces Kaiser’s philosophy of fitness-oriented lifestyles among its members. The Nike World Masters Games are the largest participatory multi-sport competition in the world, gathering together more than 25,000 men and women from more than 100 countries.

Aerodynamics and mathematics in National Socialist Germany and Fascist Italy: a comparison of research institutes.PubMed

Epple, Moritz; Karachalios, Andreas; Remmert, Volker R2005-01-01The article is concerned with the mathematical sciences in National Socialist Germany and Fascist Italy, with special attention to research important to the war effort. It focuses on three institutional developments: the expansion of the Kaiser Wilhelm Institute for Fluid Dynamics in GÃ¶ttingen, the foundation of the Reich Institute for Mathematics in Oberwolfach (Black Forest), and the work of the Istituto Nazionale per le Applicazioni del Calcolo in Rome. All three developments are embedded in the general political background, thus providing a basis for comparative conclusions about the conditions of the mathematical sciences and military-related research in Germany and Italy. It turns out that in both countries, the increasing demand for mathematical knowledge in modern warfare led to the establishment of „extra-university“ national institutions specifically devoted to mathematical research.

Otto Hahn: Responsibility and Repression NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Walker, Mark2006-05-01The role that Otto Hahn (1879 1968) played in the discovery of nuclear fission and whether Lise Meitner (1878 1968) should have shared the Nobel Prize for that discovery have been subjects of earlier studies, but there is more to the story. I examine what Hahn and the scientists in his Kaiser Wilhelm Institute for Chemistry in Berlin-Dahlem did during the Third Reich, in particular, the significant contributions they made to the German uranium project during the Second World War. I then use this as a basis for judging Hahnâ€™s postwar apologia as the last president of the Kaiser Wilhelm Society and first president of its successor, the Max Planck Society.

Achieving Kaiser Permanente Quality PubMed CentralMcHugh, Matthew D.; Aiken, Linda H.; Eckenhoff, Myra E.; Burns, Lawton R.2015-01-01Background The Kaiser Permanente model of integrated health delivery is highly regarded for high quality and efficient health care. Efforts to reproduce Kaiserâ€™s success have mostly failed. One factor that has received little attention and that could explain Kaiserâ€™s advantage is its commitment to and investment in nursing as a key component of organizational culture and patient-centered care. Purpose The aim of this study was to investigate the role of Kaiserâ€™s nursing organization in promoting quality of care. Methodology This was a cross-sectional analysis of linked secondary data from multiple sources, including a detailed survey of nurses, for 564 adult, general acute care hospitals from California, Florida, Pennsylvania, and New Jersey in 2006â€“2007. We used logistic regression models to examine whether patient (mortality and failure-to-rescue) and nurse (burnout, job satisfaction, and intent-to-leave) outcomes in Kaiser hospitals were better than in non-Kaiserhospitals. We then assessed whether differences in nursing explained outcomes differences between Kaiserand other hospitals. Finally, we examined whether Kaiserhospitals compared favorably with hospitals known for having excellent nurse work environments â€” Magnet hospitals. Findings Patient and nurse outcomes in Kaiserhospitals were significantly better compared with non-Magnet hospitals. Kaiser hospitals had significantly better nurse work environments, staffing levels, and more nurses with bachelorâ€™s degrees. Differences in nursing explained a significant proportion of the Kaiser outcomes advantage. Kaiser hospital outcomes were comparable to Magnet hospitals, where better outcomes have been largely explained by differences in nursing. Implications An important element in Kaiserâ€™s success is its investment in professional nursing, which may not be evident to systems seeking to achieve Kaiserâ€™s advantage. Our results suggest that a possible strategy for achieving outcomes like Kaiser

The Politics of Memory: Otto Hahn and the Third Reich NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Sime, Ruth Lewin2006-03-01As President of the Kaiser Wilhelm Society and its successor, the Max Planck Society, from 1946 until 1960, Otto Hahn (1879 1968) sought to portray science under the Third Reich as a purely intellectual endeavor untainted by National Socialism. I outline Hahnâ€™s activities from 1933 into the postwar years, focusing on the contrast between his personal stance during the National Socialist period, when he distinguished himself as an upright non-Nazi, and his postwar attitude, which was characterized by suppression and denial of Germanyâ€™s recent past. Particular examples include Hahnâ€™s efforts to help Jewish friends; his testimony for colleagues involved in denazification and on trial in Nuremberg; his postwar relationships with Ã©migrÃ© colleagues, including Lise Meitner; and his misrepresentation of his wartime work in the Kaiser Wilhelm Institute for Chemistry.

Questioning the claims from Kaiser PubMed Central

Talbot-Smith, Alison; Gnani, Shamini; Pollock, Allyson M; Gray, Denis Pereira2004-01-01Background: The article by Feachem et al, published in the BMJ in 2002, claimed to show that, compared with the United Kingdom (UK) National Health Service (NHS), the Kaiser Permanente healthcare system in the United States (US) has similar healthcare costs per capita, and performance that is considerably better in certain respects. Aim: To assess the accuracy of Feachem et al’s comparison and conclusions. Method: Detailed re-examination of the data and methods used and consideration of the 82 letters responding to the article. Results: Analyses revealed four main areas in which Feachem et al’s methodology was flawed. Firstly, the populations of patients served by Kaiser Permanente and by the NHS are fundamentally different. Kaiser’s patients are mainly employed, significantly younger, and significantly less socially deprived and so are healthier. Feachem et al fail to adjust adequately for these factors. Secondly, Feachem et al have wrongly inflated NHS costs by omitting substantial user charges payable by Kaisermembers for care, excluding the costs of marketing and administration, and deducting the surplus from Kaiser’s costs while underestimating the capital charge element of the NHS budget and other costs. They also used two methods of converting currency, the currency rate and a health purchasing power parity conversion. This is double counting. Feachem et al reported that NHS costs were 10% less per head than Kaiser. Correcting for the double currency conversion gives the NHS a 40% cost advantage such that per capita costs are $1161 and $1951 for the NHS and Kaiser, respectively. Thirdly, Feachem et al use non-standardised data for NHS bed days from the Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development, rather than official Department of Health bed availability and activity statistics for England. Leaving aside the non-comparability of the population and lack of standardisation of the data, the result is to inflate NHS acute bed use and underestimate the

Kaiser Permanente Northwest Cancer.gov

Kaiser Permanente Northwest’s Center for Health Research was created to study health maintenance organizations by scientists were recruited from a variety of fields to study a range of health and medical care issues.

Investigating Mars: Kaiser Crater Dunes NASA Image and Video Library

2018-02-02This is a false color image of Kaiser Crater. In this combination of filters „blue“ typically means basaltic sand. This VIS image crosses 3/4 of the crater and demonstrates how extensive the dunes are on the floor of Kaiser Crater. Kaiser Crater is located in the southern hemisphere in the Noachis region west of Hellas Planitia. Kaiser Crater is just one of several large craters with extensive dune fields on the crater floor. Other nearby dune filled craters are Proctor, Russell, and Rabe. KaiserCrater is 207 km (129 miles) in diameter. The dunes are located in the southern part of the crater floor. The THEMIS VIS camera contains 5 filters. The data from different filters can be combined in multiple ways to create a false color image. These false color images may reveal subtle variations of the surface not easily identified in a single band image. The Odyssey spacecraft has spent over 15 years in orbit around Mars, circling the planet more than 71,000 times. It holds the record for longest working spacecraft at Mars. THEMIS, the IR/VIS camera system, has collected data for the entire mission and provides images covering all seasons and lighting conditions. Over the years many features of interest have received repeated imaging, building up a suite of images covering the entire feature. From the deepest chasma to the tallest volcano, individual dunes inside craters and dune fields that encircle the north pole, channels carved by water and lava, and a variety of other feature, THEMIS has imaged them all. For the next several months the image of the day will focus on the Tharsis volcanoes, the various chasmata of Valles Marineris, and the major dunes fields. We hope you enjoy these images! Orbit Number: 66602 Latitude: -47.0551 Longitude: 19.446 Instrument: VIS Captured: 2016-12-18 21:42 https://photojournal.jpl.nasa.gov/catalog/PIA22265

Counter Nuclear, Biological, and Chemical Operations, This document compliments JCS Pub 3-11DTIC Science & Technology

2000-08-16Successful German Chemical Attack The concept of creating a toxic gas cloud from chemical cylinders was credited to Fritz Haber of the Kaiser Wilhelm Physical…of considerations: The high caliber of German theoretical and experimental physicists like Otto Hahn, Paul Harteck, Werner Heisenberg, Fritz …Institute of Berlin in late 1914. Owing to a shortage of artillery shells, Haber thought a chemical gas cloud would negate the enemyâ€™s earthworks

Investigating Mars: Kaiser Crater Dunes NASA Image and Video Library

2018-02-01This VIS image of the floor of Kaiser Crater contains several sand dune shapes and sizes. The „whiter“ material is the hard crater floor surface. Kaiser Crater is located in the southern hemisphere in the Noachis region west of Hellas Planitia. Kaiser Crater is just one of several large craters with extensive dune fields on the crater floor. Other nearby dune filled craters are Proctor, Russell, and Rabe. Kaiser Crater is 207 km (129 miles) in diameter. The dunes are located in the southern part of the crater floor. The Odyssey spacecraft has spent over 15 years in orbit around Mars, circling the planet more than 71,000 times. It holds the record for longest working spacecraft at Mars. THEMIS, the IR/VIS camera system, has collected data for the entire mission and provides images covering all seasons and lighting conditions. Over the years many features of interest have received repeated imaging, building up a suite of images covering the entire feature. From the deepest chasma to the tallest volcano, individual dunes inside craters and dune fields that encircle the north pole, channels carved by water and lava, and a variety of other feature, THEMIS has imaged them all. For the next several months the image of the day will focus on the Tharsis volcanoes, the various chasmata of Valles Marineris, and the major dunes fields. We hope you enjoy these images! Orbit Number: 39910 Latitude: -46.9063 Longitude: 19.8112 Instrument: VIS Captured: 2010-12-13 11:17 https://photojournal.jpl.nasa.gov/catalog/PIA22264