BIOGRAPHICAL MEMORANDA 



Although physically much weakened as a result of the severe depri- 

 vations suffered, and mentally shaken by the horrors experienced 

 during the war years, Kluyver set himself the task to assimilate as 

 rapidly as possible the accumulated knowledge, particularly in those 

 fields that most interested him. This led to a number of important re- 

 views, such as those he prepared on the use of isotopically labeled com- 

 pounds for the study of biochemical reaction mechanisms [1947a, -b]. 

 It also made him aware of the great strides that had been made in the 

 field of enzyme chemistry. Although, as has previously been indicateds 

 Kluyver had not been overly sanguine concerning the contribution, 

 that could be expected from this approach, the laboratory had ac- 

 quired, as early as 1938, a Booth-Green mill for the preparation of 

 enzyme extracts from bacteria, and this instrument had been used in 

 attempts to obtain cell-free extracts of luminous bacteria that still 

 possessed the capacity to emit light. Unfortunately, the results had 

 not been encouraging. 



Later, Tuynenburg Muys [1949] constructed a simple and effective 

 apparatus for disrupting microbial cells by grinding. But it was not 

 until very recently that la Riviere carried out the first successful experi- 

 ments with bacterial enzyme preparations in Kluyver's institute [1956]. 



At about the same time a beginning was there made with studies on 

 carbon dioxide assimilation by potentially autotrophic bacteria with 

 the aid of labeled carbon dioxide. 



During the early years of his directorship Kluyver spent practically 

 all his time in the laboratory, encouraging the students and guiding 

 their efforts by daily discussions in which the status of their work was 

 reviewed in the most minute detail, leading to suggestions for new 

 experiments and approaches. These sessions also served to acquaint 

 the students with pertinent information which Kluyver provided 

 from his own vast store of factual knowledge, and to point out poten- 

 tial relationships of experimental results with what at first sight often 

 appeared to be unrelated subjects. In this manner the students gradu- 

 ally became imbued with an increasingly profound appreciation of 

 the true meaning of scientific research, while the close and intensive 

 cooperation between the professor and his pupils led to the develop- 

 ment of an enthusiastic and stimulating atmosphere such as is rarely 

 encountered in a scientific laboratory. 



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