Bernhard Witkop (May 9, 1917 in

Freiburg Freiburg im Breisgau or simply Freiburg is the List of cities in Baden-Württemberg by population, fourth-largest city of the German state of Baden-Württemberg after Stuttgart, Mannheim and Karlsruhe. Its built-up area has a population of abou ...

Baden Baden (; ) is a historical territory in southern Germany. In earlier times it was considered to be on both sides of the Upper Rhine, but since the Napoleonic Wars, it has been considered only East of the Rhine. History The margraves of Ba ...

– November 22, 2010 in

Chevy Chase, Maryland Chevy Chase () is the colloquial name of an area that includes a town, several incorporated villages, and an unincorporated census-designated place in southern Montgomery County, Maryland; and one adjoining neighborhood in northwest Washington, D ...

) was a

German German(s) may refer to: * Germany, the country of the Germans and German things **Germania (Roman era) * Germans, citizens of Germany, people of German ancestry, or native speakers of the German language ** For citizenship in Germany, see also Ge ...

-born American

organic chemist Organic chemistry is a subdiscipline within chemistry involving the science, scientific study of the structure, properties, and reactions of organic compounds and organic matter, organic materials, i.e., matter in its various forms that contain ...

who worked for the

National Institutes of Health The National Institutes of Health (NIH) is the primary agency of the United States government responsible for biomedical and public health research. It was founded in 1887 and is part of the United States Department of Health and Human Service ...

(NIH) for 37 years. During those years, Witkop – along with his recruit, John Daly, and others – discovered the NIH shift, a term describing the movement of

hydrogen Hydrogen is a chemical element; it has chemical symbol, symbol H and atomic number 1. It is the lightest and abundance of the chemical elements, most abundant chemical element in the universe, constituting about 75% of all baryon, normal matter ...

deuterium Deuterium (hydrogen-2, symbol H or D, also known as heavy hydrogen) is one of two stable isotopes of hydrogen; the other is protium, or hydrogen-1, H. The deuterium nucleus (deuteron) contains one proton and one neutron, whereas the far more c ...

tritium Tritium () or hydrogen-3 (symbol T or H) is a rare and radioactive isotope of hydrogen with a half-life of ~12.33 years. The tritium nucleus (t, sometimes called a ''triton'') contains one proton and two neutrons, whereas the nucleus of the ...

to adjacent carbons on aromatic rings during oxidation, a process key in developing many therapies. He also helped to develop selective methods for the non-enzymatic cleavage of proteins, which enabled the sequencing of

amino acid Amino acids are organic compounds that contain both amino and carboxylic acid functional groups. Although over 500 amino acids exist in nature, by far the most important are the 22 α-amino acids incorporated into proteins. Only these 22 a ...

s in

protein Proteins are large biomolecules and macromolecules that comprise one or more long chains of amino acid residue (biochemistry), residues. Proteins perform a vast array of functions within organisms, including Enzyme catalysis, catalysing metab ...

s as large as

immunoglobulin An antibody (Ab) or immunoglobulin (Ig) is a large, Y-shaped protein belonging to the immunoglobulin superfamily which is used by the immune system to identify and neutralize antigens such as pathogenic bacteria, bacteria and viruses, includin ...

, a method later used in the production of

human insulin As a medication, insulin is any pharmaceutical preparation of the protein hormone insulin that is used to treat high blood glucose. Such conditions include type 1 diabetes, type 2 diabetes, gestational diabetes, and complications of diabetes ...

. Witkop also helped pioneer the NIH Visiting Fellow Program. Among other foreign scientists, he began attracting visiting researchers to the program from Japan as early as 1955. He traveled frequently to Japan, where he gave talks in classical Japanese. In 1975, Witkop received the

Order of the Sacred Treasure The is a Japanese Order (distinction), order, established on 4 January 1888 by Emperor Meiji as the Order of Meiji. Originally awarded in eight classes (from 8th to 1st, in ascending order of importance), since 2003 it has been awarded in six c ...

, bestowed by the Emperor of Japan. “He brought in the first visiting fellow from Japan at a time when we were still in the shadow of World War II,” said Kenneth Jacobson, Chief of the NIDDK Laboratory of Bioorganic Chemistry. “He broke the ice.” Other honors, among many, included election to the

National Academy of Sciences The National Academy of Sciences (NAS) is a United States nonprofit, NGO, non-governmental organization. NAS is part of the National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine, along with the National Academy of Engineering (NAE) and the ...

(1969) and the

American Philosophical Society The American Philosophical Society (APS) is an American scholarly organization and learned society founded in 1743 in Philadelphia that promotes knowledge in the humanities and natural sciences through research, professional meetings, publicat ...

(1999) as well as the

Paul Karrer Gold Medal The Paul Karrer Gold Medal and Lecture is awarded annually or biennially by the University of Zurich to an outstanding researcher in the field of chemistry. It was established in 1959 by a group of leading companies, including CIBA AG, J.R. Gei ...

from the

University of Zurich The University of Zurich (UZH, ) is a public university, public research university in Zurich, Switzerland. It is the largest university in Switzerland, with its 28,000 enrolled students. It was founded in 1833 from the existing colleges of the ...

(1971). Even long after most lights at NIH darkened, Witkop might still be found working in his lab. Thomas Witkop remembers going to visit his father at his West Virginia cabin one evening, and finding all signs that his father was present, except his father. “At approximately 4 a.m., he came rolling back up to the cabin. Apparently, he was at the cabin, had some big idea and drove to the lab at NIH in the middle of the night, did whatever he needed to do, and then came back.” Witkop served as head of the NIDDK Laboratory of Chemistry for 30 years. He was appointed an NIH Institute Scholar in 1987 and a Scholar Emeritus in 1993. Witkop’s early career coincided with World War II. A German native and Jewish on his mother’s side, he gave much of the credit for his shelter from the Nazis to his mentor at the

University of Munich The Ludwig Maximilian University of Munich (simply University of Munich, LMU or LMU Munich; ) is a public university, public research university in Munich, Bavaria, Germany. Originally established as the University of Ingolstadt in 1472 by Duke ...

, the

Nobel Prize The Nobel Prizes ( ; ; ) are awards administered by the Nobel Foundation and granted in accordance with the principle of "for the greatest benefit to humankind". The prizes were first awarded in 1901, marking the fifth anniversary of Alfred N ...

-winner

Heinrich Wieland Heinrich Otto Wieland (; 4 June 1877 – 5 August 1957) was a German chemist. He won the 1927 Nobel Prize in Chemistry for his research into the bile acids. Career In 1901 Wieland received his doctorate at the University of Munich while studying ...

. After a few years at Harvard University, Witkop came to NIH as a fellow in the

United States Public Health Service The United States Public Health Service (USPHS or PHS) is a collection of agencies of the Department of Health and Human Services which manages public health, containing nine out of the department's twelve operating divisions. The assistant s ...

in 1950. Thomas Witkop said his father’s NIH service was a high point of his life.

References

External links

* * https://web.archive.org/web/20060923063004/http://www.depauw.edu/library/archives/dpuinventories/julian_collection_s3_f2.htm
Science Biography from Scripps

German Biography from Ludwig Maximilians University
{{DEFAULTSORT:Witkop, Bernhard 1917 births 2010 deaths 20th-century German chemists 20th-century American chemists Scientists from Freiburg im Breisgau Harvard University faculty Ludwig Maximilian University of Munich alumni German emigrants to the United States Members of the United States National Academy of Sciences Members of the European Academy of Sciences and Arts Members of the American Philosophical Society

See also

References

External links