| Oscar Liebreich | |
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Oscar Liebreich
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| Born | 14 February 1839 Königsberg, Germany |
| Died | 2 July 1908 (aged 69) Berlin, Germany |
| Institutions | Pharmacology Institute in Berlin, Balneologischen Gesellschaft |
| Alma mater | University of Wiesbaden, University of Berlin |
| Doctoral advisor | Carl Remigius Fresenius chemistry, Rudolf Virchow medicine |
| Known for | sedative chloral hydrate |
Matthias Eugen Oscar Liebreich (14 February 1839 - 2 July 1908) was a German pharmacologist.
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He was a native of Königsberg. He studied chemistry under Carl Remigius Fresenius (1818–1897) in Wiesbaden, and studied medicine in Königsberg, Tübingen and Berlin, achieving his degree in 1865. Beginning in 1867 he worked as an assistant in the chemistry department of the pathological institute under Rudolf Virchow. Later he became professor of therapeutics (1868) and director of the Pharmacology Institute in Berlin (1872). In 1889 he co-founded the Balneologischen Gesellschaft (Balneology Society) in Berlin, and was its chairman until his death in 1908.
Liebreich introduced the method of phaneroscopic illumination for the study of lupus; showed the value of cantharidin in tuberculosis, of mercuric formamide and of lanolin in syphilis, of butylchloral hydrate and of ethylene chloride[note 1] as anesthetics. In 1865, he gave the name protagon to a proximate principle discovered in the brain and in blood corpuscles.
He is well-known for his investigations of the sedative and hypnotic properties of chloral hydrate in 1869, and was a major figure concerning the drugs' popularity in the latter half of the 19th century. He also made important contributions in his chemical research of boracic acid.
Liebreich edited the Therapeutische Monatshefte (1887 sqq.) and the Encyklopädie der Therapie (1895 sqq.), and with Alexander Langgard published a Kompendium der Arzneiverordnung (5th ed. 1902).
He was a younger brother of ophthalmologist Richard Liebreich (1830–1917).