February 24. 1898J 



NATURE 



395 



WOLDEMAR VON SCHRODER. 



T T EIDELBERG has had to mourn the loss in rapid 

 -*■-*■ succession of three of its most distinguished pro- 

 fessors — Victor Meyer, Erwin Rohde and, on January 28 

 of this year, Woldemar von Schroder. 



Schroder was bom at Dorpat in 1850, where his father 

 was director of the Gymnasium. On his mother's side 

 he inherited a taste for literature and poetry, but on 

 entering the University at Dorpat, in 1868, he devoted 

 himself to the natural sciences, possibly influenced thereto 

 by his uncle, von Schrenk (of St. Petersburg), who was 

 celebrated for his journeys and researches in Siberia. 

 At first he studied chiefly chemistry and physics under 

 Karl Schmidt and Arthur von Oettingen, and trained 

 himself under Lemberg to that high pitch of analytical 

 skill which he manifested in all his later work. After a 

 break in his studies, due to persistent pains in the head 

 and trouble with his eyes, h.e again returned to work ; 

 now, however, turning his attention rather into a biological 

 direction. In 1878 he left Dorpat with the degree of 

 Master of Chemistry, and went to Leipzig, where he was 

 at once attracted by the striking originality and person- 

 ality of Karl Ludwig, and in his laboratory saw for the 

 first time the perfection of physiological experimenting. 

 But Schroder was one of the few who were not content 

 to learn by merely assisting Ludwig in personally 

 carrying out all the experiments, and he struck out 

 into paths of his own. Skilled as a chemist, he 

 soon became an expert operator, and succeeded for 

 the first time in successfully extirpating the kidney in 

 birds, and thus settling a most important question as to 

 the seat of formation of uric acid. In 1879 he became 

 assistant to Schmiedeberg in Strassburg, and here it was 

 that he carried out the great research with which his 

 name will for all time be connected in the annals of 

 physiology. Very little was at that time known as to the 

 mode and seat of formation of urea, and Schroder threw 

 a flood of light into the darkness. Having by extirpation 

 of the kidneys, and artificial circulation through the 

 excised organs, proved that urea is not formed by them, 

 he next carried on an artificial circulation of blood con- 

 taining ammonium carbonate through the muscles, and 

 found that in them also no synthetic formation of urea 

 takes place. He now turned to the liver and, again 

 making use of artificial circulation, proved without any 

 possibility of doubt the power of this organ to actively 

 synthetise urea from ammonium carbonate and from 

 certain substances present in the blood from an animal in 

 full digestion. This was a great work, for not only did 

 it reveal clearly a striking instance of synthetic activity 

 in the animal organism, and thus place our belief in the 

 fundamental similarity of plants and animal protoplasm 

 on a firm basis, but it fixed definitely one seat of 

 formation of urea in the animal body. In recog- 

 nition of this work he received the degree of Doctor 

 from the Natural Science Faculty of Tubingen 

 in 1882, and similarly, and in the same year, he 

 was made a Doctor at Strassburg, where he became 

 Privat-docent in 1883. For this he wrote his in- 

 augural dissertation on the alkaloids of opium, and 

 thus diverged into that branch of science, pharma- 

 cology, which was henceforth to be the business of his 

 life. During the next few years his chief works were on 

 the physiological action of caffeine and of theobromine 

 as related to caffeine, while at the same time he con- 

 verted theobromine into a more soluble and assimilable 

 compound, making it thus available for medicinal 

 purposes. In 1890 Schroder was called to Heidelberg as 

 Professor of Pharmacology, and he it was who really 

 founded the existing Pharmacological Institute, turning 

 the older accommodation to the best account, utilising or 

 enlarging every corner of it, and completely remodelling 

 and organising the teaching. Here he worked until his 



NO. 1478, VOL. 57] 



death, stimulating his pupils by his personal example and 

 collaboration, brightening their labours by his sympathetic 

 and genial ways, and impressing on all the right spirit of 

 scientific life. 



THE KEKUL^ MEMORIAL. 



THE death of August Kekul^ on February 13, 1897,. 

 terminated a career rich in scientific achievement. 

 In him we have lost an investigator who has exerted a 

 profound influence on the development of chemistry. 



The theory of valency and of the linking of atoms, and 

 our present views as to the structure of carbon com- 

 pounds, have acquired their definite form and clearness 

 by the labours of Kekule. His theory of benzene 

 derivatives, in particular, has given the most powerful 

 impulse to investigation in the domain of pure chemistry ;. 

 while no scientific theory has done more to promote the 

 development of chemistry as a branch of industry. While 

 Kekule is eminent by his scientific achievements, he is 

 not less so by reason of the effects produced by his 

 teaching. The publication of his " Lehrbuch der 

 Organischen Chemie" marked an epoch in the history 

 of chemistry. This treatise has done more to familiarise 

 chemists with modern views than any other work of the 

 kind. 



The greater number of German professors of 

 chemistry, and many of those in other countries, have 

 either studied under Kekule or under those who were his 

 pupils : and gratitude calls for the erection of some 

 permanent memorial of his striking personality. 



Such a memorial would be a statue in bronze of the 

 founder of structural chemistry, which would be fitly 

 placed in front of the Chemical Institute at Bonn — in the 

 place where for thirty years he lived and taught and 

 worked. 



All friends, admirers and pupils of Kekule are accord- 

 ingly invited to contribute to this object. Subscriptions^ 

 which will be forwarded to the Central Committee at 

 Bonn, will be received by Dr. Hugo Miiller, 13 Park 

 Square East, Regent's Park, N.W. 



James Dewar. Hugo Muller. 



G. Carey Foster. Francis R. Japp. 

 T. E. Thorpe. Raphael Meldola. 



NOTES. 

 Acting under the rule which empowers the annual election 

 by the Committee of nine persons " of distinguished eminence 

 in science, literature, the arts, or for public services," the Com- 

 mittee have just elected Viscount Dillon (president of the Society 

 of Antiquaries), Mr. R. T. Glazebrook, F.R.S., and Sit 

 George Scott Robertson into the Clulx 



The meeting for the discussion of the scientific advantages of 

 an Antarctic expedition takes place at the Royal Society this 

 afternoon. We purpose giving a full account of the meeting in 

 next week's Nature, accompanied by a map showing all known 

 land south of latitude 45° S., with drift and pack ice limits, so 

 far as known, and the positions and dates of the highest 

 latitudes reached. 



The Berlin correspondent of the Standard reports that the 

 German Antarctic Expedition Committee, which met at Leipzig 

 on Saturday last, unanimously resolved, after a long discussion, 

 to advocate the despatch of a ship towards the South Pole on or 

 near the meridian of the island of Kerguelen. Oceanic, 

 geodetic, and biological researches are to be made during the 

 voyage, and, if possible, the expedition will winter in the 

 Antarctic zone. In that case geological observations are to be 

 made at a fixed station, and exploring journeys on the inland 



