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Sci Tech
Georg Schneider (1909-1970): Anti-Mendelian geneticist
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Schneider promoted Lysenko's ideas and their use in agricultural practice in the GDR. He was given the highest awards.
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GEORG SCHNEIDER was born in Saarbruecken, East Germany and studied in Jena University from 1928 to 1931. As he encountered difficulties in finding a job, he emigrated to the Soviet Union.
From 1931 to 1945 he was in exile, working as a teacher for a few years in Moscow schools and later in a famous institute at the Academy of Sciences, the U.S.S.R.
In 1945, he earned a Ph.D. degree in Jena for his thesis. He became director of the Ernst Haeckel House (EHH). Schneider's political connections propelled him to an influential status in East German Science.
In 1947, Schneider tried to obtain the `Habilitation', a title normally required to qualify for professorship in Germany. He did not succeed with his habilitation thesis.
Nonetheless, he became a tenured professor of theoretical biology during 1951-1959 in Jena University.
In 1959 he joined the embassy of the German Democratic Republic (GDR) as a diplomat in charge of cultural affairs.
He returned to Jena in 1962 and served as professor till 1970, when drunk, he drove his car into an armoured vehicle belonging to the Red Army and died tragically. Schneider used his position as director of EHH to promote the doctrine of Lysenkoism; in support of it Schneider developed his career in the GDR.
Lysenkoism
The anti-Mendelian theories developed through research by the cold treatment of seed to stimulate germination were developed by Lysenko, a Ukrainian agronomist, in the 1930s, in the then Soviet Union. For agriculture Lysenko developed his anti-Mendelian theory.
This means the grain could be sown during the spring season instead of the previous fall. The land use within the Soviet Union for agriculture was thus extended. After Stalin's death in 1953 Lysenko's doctrine lost influence.
Schneider promoted Lysenko's ideas and their use in agricultural practice in the GDR. He was given the highest awards. His book The Theory of Evolution: The Fundamental Problem of Modern Biology was published in 1950 and was in its third edition in 1952.
Leading researchers in classical genetics in the German Democratic Republic, who conducted a research programme between 1949 and 1960 produced irrefutable, reproducible results in support of the Mendelian genetics.
They showed that Lysenko and his followers often worked with contaminated material, used careless experimental procedures and employed conscious manipulation of experimental results.
Schneider's work in evolutionary biology had no influence on further development of biology in the GDR for most biologists avoided the Lysenko doctrines and stood against mixing science and politics. (`Portraits of Science' in Science, 5 July 2002)
R. Parthasarathy
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