Ullrich Trendelenburg

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From: Pharmacology International No. 68, June 2007.

Professor Ullrich Trendelenburg, born on December 31st, 1922 in Gelsdorf, Germany, died on November 21st, 2006 in Tübingen, where he had been living in retirement with his wife, Christel. Professor Trendelenburg followed in the footsteps of his father, Paul Trendelenburg, a famous
German pharmacologist who headed the pharmacology departments in Rostock, Freiburg, and Berlin. The younger Trendelenburg first studied medicine at the University of Göttingen and later at the University of Uppsala where he worked on his M.D. thesis. From 1952–1956 he was a Ph.D. student, a British Council scholarship holder, and an instructor in the Department of Pharmacology at Oxford University. After spending a year in the Department of Pharmacology at the University of Mainz, Professor Trendelenburg joined the Department of Pharmacology at Harvard Medical School in 1957. From 1966-1968, following the retirement of Professor Otto Krayer, his mentor and friend, Professor Trendelenburg served as the Acting Head of the department at Harvard. From 1968 until his retirement in 1991, Professor Trendelenburg was Head of the Institute of Pharmacology at the University of Wurzburg.

As a student in Uppsala, Professor Trendelenburg began his studies in pharmacology by examining the antitussive effects of morphine derivatives. During his time at Oxford he developed a lasting fascination with the sympathetic nervous system, having undertaken studies on the pharmacology of ganglion cells, with experiments utilizing both nicotinic and non-nicotinic ganglion-stimulating agents. He was the first to identify presynaptic morphine receptors on noradrenergic neurons. At Harvard, his main research interest was the pharmacology of directly and indirectly acting sympathomimetic amines and the effects of cocaine on their actions. Professor Trendelenburg continued these studies in Würzburg, directing particular attention to the uptake of monoamines by neuronal and extraneuronal transporters, to intraneuronal storage, and to the neuronal and extraneuronal metabolism of these substances.

Professor Trendelenburg was President of the German Pharmacological Society and the 2nd Vice-President of IUPHAR. He also served as a member of the IUPHAR Receptor Nomenclature Committee (NC-IUPHAR). He was a Field Editor for the Journal of Pharmacology and Experimental Therapeutics, and for many years he was the Managing Editor of Naunyn-Schmiedeberg’s Archives of Pharmacology,the oldest international journal in the field. He held membership in a number of pharmacology societies around the world, and was awarded honorary doctorates from universities in Portugal, Poland, Czhekoslovakia, and the United States.

His final publication, which appeared in March 2006, was a booklet entitled “Verfolgte deutschprachige Pharmakologen 1933–1945” (“Persecuted German-speaking Pharmacologists 1933–1945”). It contained a compilation of 69 curriculum vitae of German-speaking pharmacologists who were victimized by the Nazis.

Professor Ullrich Trendelenburg had a profound scientific impact in pharmacology through his rigorous and creative research and through the scientists who had the privilege of receiving training with him. Last but not least, Ullrich Trendelenburg was a real gentleman in his ethical standards for justice and fairness. Both the scientific achievements and his high moral principles throughout his long scientific carrier place Ullrich Trendelenburg among the top most influential pharmacologists in our generation.

With his passing, IUPHAR and the scientific community as a whole has lost a great friend and supporter. As evidenced by his students and research accomplishments, his legacy will have a lasting effect on our discipline.

Dr. Heinz Bönisch,
Dr. Edmund Przegaliñski,
Dr. Barbara Malinowska

Edited/revised by Drs. Salomon Langer and S. J. Enna.
(Reprinted with permission from the Polish Academy of Sciences Institute of Pharmacology. Copyright 2007)
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