Hans Tuppy is a
biochemistBiochemists are scientists who are trained in biochemistry. Typical biochemists study chemical processes and chemical transformations in living organisms. The prefix of "bio" in "biochemist" can be understood as a fusion of "biological chemist."-Role:...
who participated in the sequencing of insulin, and became Austria's first university professor for biochemistry. He was Austrian Minister for Science and Research from 1987−1989.
Family background and youth
Hans Tuppy's parents were from the present day
Czech RepublicThe Czech Republic is a landlocked country in Central Europe. The country is bordered by Poland to the northeast, Slovakia to the east, Austria to the south, and Germany to the west and northwest....
, his mother Emma from Prague and his father Karl from
BrünnBrno by population and area is the second largest city in the Czech Republic, the largest Moravian city, and the historical capital city of the Margraviate of Moravia. Brno is the administrative centre of the South Moravian Region where it forms a separate district Brno-City District...
. Karl Tuppy (Jan. 1, 1880 - Nov. 15, 1939) was chief
prosecutorThe prosecutor is the chief legal representative of the prosecution in countries with either the common law adversarial system, or the civil law inquisitorial system...
in the trial against those members of the illegal
Austrian Nazi partyAustrian National Socialism was a Pan-German movement that was formed at the beginning of the 20th century. The movement took a concrete form on November 15, 1903 when the German Worker's Party was established in Austria with its secretariat stationed in the town of Aussig...
who had murdered chancellor
Engelbert DollfussEngelbert Dollfuss was an Austrian Christian Social and Patriotic Front statesman. Serving previously as Minister for Forest and Agriculture, he ascended to Federal Chancellor in 1932 in the midst of a crisis for the conservative government...
during the abortive 1934
July PutschThe July Putsch was a failed coup d'etat attempt against the Austrofascist regime by Austrian Nazis, which took place between 25 – 30 July 1934.- Background :...
. After Austria's
AnschlussThe Anschluss , also known as the ', was the occupation and annexation of Austria into Nazi Germany in 1938....
Karl Tuppy was detained and eventually moved to the
Sachsenhausen concentration campSachsenhausen or Sachsenhausen-Oranienburg was a Nazi concentration camp in Oranienburg, Germany, used primarily for political prisoners from 1936 to the end of the Third Reich in May, 1945. After World War II, when Oranienburg was in the Soviet Occupation Zone, the structure was used as an NKVD...
, where he was so savagely beaten upon his arrival that he died the following night. While Hans Tuppy's older brother Peter was killed in action as a Wehrmacht soldier in 1944, Hans (who completed secondary school in 1942) was ordered into the
ReichsarbeitsdienstThe Reichsarbeitsdienst was an institution established by Nazi Germany as an agency to reduce unemployment, similar to the relief programs in other countries. During the Second World War it was an auxiliary formation which provided support for the Wehrmacht.The RAD was formed during July 1934 as...
but was soon released from duty after suffering a severe injury.
Career
Tuppy's early release from RAD service enabled him to commence studies at the
University of ViennaThe University of Vienna is a public university located in Vienna, Austria. It was founded by Duke Rudolph IV in 1365 and is the oldest university in the German-speaking world...
even before World War II had ended in Austria, and to complete the requirements for his diploma in 1945. His doctoral work was initiated in the laboratory of Professor
Ernst SpäthErnst Späth was an Austrian chemist.He was the first to synthesise Mescaline and was one of the first to synthesize cuscohygrine on a small scale with Hans Tuppy....
. Following Späth’s death in 1946, Tuppy worked under the supervision of Friedrich Galinovsky and obtained his Ph.D. degree in 1948.
Shortly thereafter Professor Frederick Wessely, Director of the Chemistry Institute recommended Tuppy to
Max PerutzMax Ferdinand Perutz, OM, CH, CBE, FRS was an Austrian-born British molecular biologist, who shared the 1962 Nobel Prize for Chemistry with John Kendrew, for their studies of the structures of hemoglobin and globular proteins...
for postdoctoral work at Cambridge University. Perutz, in turn, recommended Tuppy to
Frederick SangerFrederick Sanger, OM, CH, CBE, FRS is an English biochemist and a two-time Nobel laureate in chemistry, the only person to have been so. In 1958 he was awarded a Nobel prize in chemistry "for his work on the structure of proteins, especially that of insulin"...
. Thus Tuppy joined Sanger’s laboratory at Cambridge where he worked on the amino acid sequence of bovine
insulinInsulin is a hormone central to regulating carbohydrate and fat metabolism in the body. Insulin causes cells in the liver, muscle, and fat tissue to take up glucose from the blood, storing it as glycogen in the liver and muscle....
, sequencing its beta chain. (Sanger was awarded the
Nobel PrizeThe Nobel Prizes are annual international awards bestowed by Scandinavian committees in recognition of cultural and scientific advances. The will of the Swedish chemist Alfred Nobel, the inventor of dynamite, established the prizes in 1895...
in 1958 for sequencing insulin.)
Tuppy's next career step was the
Carlsberg LaboratoryThe Carlsberg Laboratory in Copenhagen, Denmark was created in 1875 by J. C. Jacobsen, the founder of the Carlsberg brewery, for the sake of advancing biochemical knowledge, especially relating to brewing. It featured a Department of Chemistry and a Department of Physiology...
in Copenhagen, from where he returned to the University of Vienna in 1951 to become an assistant at the Institute for Chemistry II. In 1956 he completed the
Habilitation, the highest academic qualification in the Austrian academic system which qualifies the recipient to supervise doctoral students and, ultimately, to hold senior faculty positions. In 1963, Tuppy became Professor of Biochemistry in the Institute of Biochemistry at the University of Vienna. In 1973, he received the Schrödinger Prize of the
Austrian Academy of SciencesThe Austrian Academy of Sciences is a legal entity under the special protection of the Federal Republic of Austria. According to the statutes of the Academy its mission is to promote the sciences and humanities in every respect and in every field, particularly in fundamental research...
.
During his distinguished career Professor Tuppy has been President of the Austrian Science Fund (1974-1982), Rector of the University of Vienna (1983-1985), President of the Austria Academy of Sciences (1985-1987) and the Austrian Government Minister for Science and Research (1987-1989) during the
chancellorshipThe Federal Chancellor is the head of government in Austria. Its deputy is the Vice-Chancellor. Before 1918, the equivalent office was the Minister-President of Austria. The Federal Chancellor is considered to be the most powerful political position in Austrian politics.-Appointment:The...
of
Franz VranitzkyFranz Vranitzky is an Austrian politician. A member of the Social Democratic Party of Austria , he was Chancellor of Austria from 1986 to 1997.-Early life and career:...
. He is Chair of the University board of the
University of Natural Resources and Applied Life Sciences ViennaThe University of Natural Resources and Life Sciences, Vienna, or simply BOKU , founded in 1872, is a Vienna university. There are currently around 10500 students enrolled at BOKU.- Campus :The original campus was built in 1896 in the Türkenschanzpark in Vienna's 18th and 19th districts...
(2003-present).
External links