Hugo Spatz (2 September 1888 – 27 January 1969) was a disgraced German
neuropathologist
Neuropathology is the study of disease of nervous system tissue, usually in the form of either small surgical biopsies or whole-body autopsies. Neuropathologists usually work in a department of anatomic pathology, but work closely with the cli ...
most known for conducting research on the brains of executed prisoners and children during the
Holocaust
The Holocaust (), known in Hebrew language, Hebrew as the (), was the genocide of History of the Jews in Europe, European Jews during World War II. From 1941 to 1945, Nazi Germany and Collaboration with Nazi Germany and Fascist Italy ...
. In 1937, he was appointed director of the
Kaiser Wilhelm Institute for Brain Research. He was a member of the
Nazi Party
The Nazi Party, officially the National Socialist German Workers' Party ( or NSDAP), was a far-right politics, far-right political party in Germany active between 1920 and 1945 that created and supported the ideology of Nazism. Its precursor ...
, and admitted to knowingly performing much of his controversial research on the brains of executed prisoners. Along with
Julius Hallervorden, he is credited with the discovery of Hallervorden-Spatz syndrome (now referred to as
Pantothenate kinase-associated neurodegeneration). Hugo Spatz's ''
Oberarzt'' (senior resident or attending physician), 1937–1939,
Richard Lindenberg, became chief neuropathologist of the State of Maryland.
See also
*
List of medical eponyms with Nazi associations
An eponym is a phrase that is derived from or based on a person's name. Medical conditions are often named after the person who first described the disorder and can also be named after the first person in whom the disorder presented or the area i ...
References
1888 births
1969 deaths
Nazi human subject research
Physicians in the Nazi Party
Max Planck Institute directors
Neuropathologists
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