Friedrich Sertürner

Friedrich Sertürner

Friedrich Wilhelm Adam Sertürner
Born 19 June 1783
Neuhaus
Died 20 February 1841(1841-02-20) (aged 57)
Hamelin
Nationality German
Fields Pharmacology
Known for Morphine

Friedrich Wilhelm Adam Sertürner (19 June 1783 – 20 February 1841) was a German pharmacist, who discovered morphine in 1804.[1]

Biography

He was born on 19 June 1783 in Schloß Neuhaus (now part of Paderborn).

As a pharmacist's apprentice in Paderborn, he was the first to isolate morphine from opium. He called the isolated alkaloid "morphium" after the Greek god of dreams, Morpheus. He published a comprehensive paper on its isolation, crystallization, crystal structure, and pharmacological properties, which he studied first in stray dogs and then in self-experiments.[2] It was not only the first alkaloid to be extracted from opium, but the first ever alkaloid to be isolated from any plant. Thus he became the first person to isolate the active ingredient associated with a medicinal plant or herb.

In the years following, he investigated the effects of morphine. However, it only became widely used after 1815. In 1809, Sertürner opened his first own pharmacy in Einbeck. In 1822, he bought the main pharmacy in Hamelin (Rathaus Apotheke), where he worked until his death in 1841.

References

  1. Meyer, Klaus (2004). "Dem Morphin auf der Spur". Pharmazeutischen Zeitung (in German). GOVI-Verlag. Retrieved 8 September 2009.
  2. Atanasov AG, Waltenberger B, Pferschy-Wenzig EM, Linder T, Wawrosch C, Uhrin P, Temml V, Wang L, Schwaiger S, Heiss EH, Rollinger JM, Schuster D, Breuss JM, Bochkov V, Mihovilovic MD, Kopp B, Bauer R, Dirsch VM, Stuppner H. Discovery and resupply of pharmacologically active plant-derived natural products: A review. Biotechnol Adv. 2015 Aug 15., PMID 26281720

Further reading

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