Kobel biography
From Berlin to Frankfurt am Main: Biochemist Maria Kobel contributed to “Beilstein’s Handbook of Organic Chemistry” for more than three decades.
Maria Kobel was born on 5 August 1897 as the eldest of ten siblings in Liegnitz in Lower Silesia (now Legnica, Poland). From 1918 to 1921, she studied chemistry in Breslau (now Wroclaw, Poland) and was awarded her doctorate in 1921 for her thesis “On the substances referred to in the literature as glyoxylurea”. In the same year, she moved to Berlin.
Her outstanding academic and doctoral achievements did not go unnoticed, and in 1924 she was employed by biochemist Carl Neuberg (1877–1956), a pupil of Alfred Wohl (1863–1939), at the Kaiser Wilhelm Institute (KWI) for Experimental Therapy in Berlin-Dahlem. Shortly afterwards, the institute was renamed the KWI for Biochemistry. From 1929 to 1936, Kobel headed the Department of Tobacco Research there.
Neuberg was Kobel’s scientific mentor until his dismissal in 1934 and subsequent expulsion because of his Jewish origins. Their shared research focus was the phosphoric acid esters of glycerol (common name glycerine). Kobel and Neuberg published specialist articles together, with titles such as “Phosphoric Acid Esters in Carbohydrate Metabolism” and “The Ferments and Their Effects”. Neuberg’s extensive list of publications reveals that women often contributed to his work. Compared with other institutes of the Kaiser Wilhelm Society, Neuberg’s institute employed more women scientists. Moreover, relatively many female students were awarded doctorates at the KWI for Biochemistry. Kobel remained on friendly terms with her mentor until his death in 1956.
Before his emigration, Neuberg succeeded in finding Kobel a position at the “Hofmann House” in Berlin. The building at Sigismundstraße 4 was the seat of the German Chemical Society until 1945; August Wilhelm von Hofmann (1818–1892) had been one of its co-founders. Kobel’s scientific productivity is evidenced by the papers she published, among others, in the four-volume handbook “Methods of Ferment Research”, published in 1941.
From 1941 onwards, Kobel worked for, and later headed a department in, the Editorial staff of “Beilstein’s Handbook of Organic Chemistry”. Commonly referred to by chemists simply as “Beilstein”, the work is a comprehensive catalogue of compounds in organic chemistry and is now continued as the Beilstein database. With the support of Frankfurt Nobel laureate Otto Hahn (1879–1968), the Beilstein Institute was established as a foundation in Frankfurt am Main in 1951. As an employee of the institute, Kobel helped shape “Beilstein”. She is still listed as an author and editor of Beilstein’s Handbook of Organic Chemistry into the mid-1970s.
Maria Kobel died in Kronberg im Taunus on 14 August 1996, shortly after her 99th birthday.
Literature
H. Conrads, B. Lohff: Carl Neuberg – Biochemistry, Politics and History. The Life and Work of an Almost Forgotten Researcher, Steiner, Stuttgart, 2006
M. Engel: The History of Dahlem, Berlin-Verlag, Berlin, 1984
A. Vogt: Women Scientists at Kaiser Wilhelm Institutes A–Z, 2nd expanded edition, Archive for the History of the Max Planck Society, Berlin, 2008, pp. 98–100
E. Baman, K. Myrbäck (editors): The Methods of Ferment Research, four volumes, Thieme, Leipzig, 1941
Authors
Prof. Dr. Eberhard Ehlers
Prof. Dr. Heribert Offermanns
Editorial work
Dr. Uta Neubauer
Project management
Dr. Karin J. Schmitz (GDCh-public relations)
The authors are responsible for the content of the biographies.
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