Martin Heisenberg
Martin Heisenberg ( born August 7, 1940 in Munich) is a German neurobiologist and geneticist. He was until 2009 held the chair for genetics and neurobiology at the Biozentrum, University of Würzburg and has a senior professor at the Rudolf Virchow Center Würzburg held since 2010. He is regarded as the founder of Neurogenetics in Germany.
Life
As the son of the physicist Werner Heisenberg and his wife Elisabeth ( nee Schumacher ) came Heisenberg early with scientific questions into contact. He spent his childhood in Leipzig, Urfeld and Göttingen. With the appointment of the Father Werner Heisenberg to Munich, the company moved there. In 1959, Martin Heisenberg put on Maximiliansgymnasium Munich the Abitur. After studying chemistry and molecular biology in Munich and Tübingen and promotion of the genetics of bacteriophages in 1966 Heisenberg explored in Pasadena in the laboratory of Max Delbrück, the genetics of the fungus Phycomyces. In 1968, Heisenberg began his research on the fruit fly Drosophila at the Tübingen Max Planck Institute for Biological Cybernetics in the laboratory of Karl Georg Götz. From there, Heisenberg was appointed in 1975 professor at the Julius -Maximilians -Universität Würzburg and worked until his retirement in 2009 and the subsequent change to the Rudolf Virchow Center, Director of the Institute of Genetics and Neurobiology at the local Biozentrum.
Heisenberg explained the Neurogenetics in Germany by using one of the first brain development in Drosophila mutants to investigate the relationship between brain structure and behavior. His scientific achievements are reflected in a variety of publications. Heisenberg has also repeatedly discussed the status of biology in society, the nature of perception and the relationship between neurobiology and free will.
Heisenberg is married to Apollonia Countess zu Eulenburg, a niece of Carl Friedrich and Richard von Weizsäcker. The couple has four children, including Benjamin Heisenberg.
Awards / Memberships
Publications (selection)
English-language scientific papers (selection)
- M. Heisenberg, A. Borst, S. Wagner, D. Byers, Drosophila mushroom body mutants are deficient in olfactory learning. J. Neurogenetics. 2, 1-30 (1985 )
- J. S. Debelle and M. Heisenberg: Associative odor learning in Drosophila Abolished by chemical ablation of mushroom bodies. Science 263, 692-695 (1994 )
- L. Liu, R. Wolf, R. Ernst, and M. Heisenberg: Context generalization in Drosophila visual learning requires the mushroom bodies. Nature 400, 753-756 (1999)
- T. Czar, M. Fischer, R. Schulz and M. Heisenberg: Localization of a short- term memory in Drosophila. Science 288, 672-675 (2000)
- M. SCHWÄRZEL, M. Monasterioti, H. Scholz, F. Friggi - Grelin, S. Birman and M. Heisenberg: Dopamine and octopamine differentiate in between aversive and appetitive olfactory memories in Drosophila. J Neurosci 23, 10495-10502 (2003)
- S. Tang, R. Wolf, S. Xu and M. Heisenberg: Visual pattern recognition in Drosophila is invariant for retinal position. Science 305, 1020-1022 (2004)
- G. Liu, H. Seiler, A. Wen, T. Tsar, K. Ito, R. Wolf, M. Heisenberg and L. Liu: Distinct memory traces for two visual features in the Drosophila brain. Nature 439, 551-556 (2006)
- J. Rister, D. Pauls, B. Schnell, C.Y. Ting, C. H. Lee, I. Sinakevitch, J. Morante, N. J. Strausfeld, K. Ito and M. Heisenberg: Dissection of the peripheral motion channel in the visual system of Drosophila melanogaster. Neuron 56, 155-170 (2007)
- P. Sareen, R. Wolf and M. Heisenberg: Attracting the attention of a fly. Proc Natl Acad Sci USA 108, 7230-7235 (2011)
Books and editorship
- M. Heisenberg, R. Wolf: vision in Drosophila. Vol XII, of: . Studies of Brain Function, V. Braitenberg, Ed, Springer-Verlag, Berlin, Heidelberg, New York ( 1984)
- M. Heisenberg ( Ed. ). Special issue Mushroom body. Learning & Memory 5 (1998)
English-language review articles and essays (a selection)
- M. Heisenberg: voluntariness ( arbitrary capability) and the general organization of behavior. In: Flexibility and constraint in behavioral systems, RJ Greenspan and C. P. Kyriacou, eds.; pp147 -156, John Wiley & Sons Ltd.. (1994)
- Heisenberg M. Mushroom body memoir: From maps to models. Nature Rev Neurosci 4, 266-275 (2003)
- M. Heisenberg: Is free will an illusion? Nature 459, 1052-1053 (2003)
- B. Gerber, H. Tanimoto, and M. Heisenberg: An engram found? Evaluating the evidence from fruit flies. Curr Op Neurobiol 14, 737-744 (2004)
German -language review articles and essays (a selection)
- M. Heisenberg: Initial activity and arbitrary behavior in animals. Science 70, 70-78 (1983 )
- M. Heisenberg: freedom from the perspective of behavioral research in: order and disorder. G. Becker, H. Becker, L. Huber, Eds.; pp. 74-82, Beltz Verlag ( 1985)
- M. Heisenberg: About universals of perception and their genetic basis. In: Mannheimer Forum 89/90 H.v.Ditfurth, E. P. Fischer, Eds.; Vol 1104, pp. 11-69. Piper Munich, Zurich
- M. Heisenberg: freedom as a property of behavior. Nova Acta Leopoldina NF 86, 79-95 (2002)
- M. Heisenberg: The mushroom bodies of insects - Trojan Horse functional brain research? Neuroforum 2, 179-186 (2002)
Academic writings
- M. Heisenberg: A new gene function of bacteriophage Fr. Dissertation, Eberhard -Karls- University of Tübingen (1966 )