Helmut Beinert

Helmut Beinert (born 17 November 1913 in Lahr / Schwarzwald, † 21 December 2007) was an American biochemist.

Beinert was after high school first actor, but then studied chemistry at the University of Leipzig and the University of Heidelberg. In 1943 he received his doctorate in Leipzig and was from 1943 to 1945 at the Kaiser Wilhelm Institute of Medicine in Heidelberg. From 1946 he was a biochemist at the U.S. Air Force Aeromedical Center in Germany and from 1947 at the U.S. Air Force School of Aviation Medicine. From 1950 he conducted research at the Institute for Enzyme Research at the University of Wisconsin -Madison, where he was an Assistant Professor in 1952 and Professor in 1962. From 1958 he was there Bureau of the Section 3 and from 1984 he was professor emeritus. Until 1994, he taught at the Medical College of Wisconsin in Milwaukee.

He dealt particularly with metal-containing enzymes, especially the structure and function of proteins with iron and sulfur and studied the components of the respiratory chain in the mitochondria by EPR ( Electron Paramagnetic Resonance).

He was a member of the National Academy of Sciences (1980 ) and the American Academy of Arts and Sciences (1979). In 1994 he received the Otto Warburg Medal, 1989, Hans- cancer Medal of the European Biochemical Society, 1985, Keilin Medal of the British Biochemical Society and in 1993 he held the Lipmann Lecture and received the Lipmann plaque. In 1981, he was a Senior Scientist of the Alexander von Humboldt Foundation.

He was an honorary doctorate from the University of Wisconsin in Milwaukee (1987) and the University of Konstanz (1994 ), where he was a visiting professor from 1967.

He was married to Elizabeth Meyhoefer since 1944 and had four children. Beinert 1955 became an American citizen.