Günther Enderlein
Encyclopedia
Günther Enderlein was a German
zoologist, entomologist and later a manufacturer of pharmaceutical products. Enderlein got some international renown because of his insect research but in Germany he became famous because of his concept of the pleomorphism of microorganisms and his hypotheses
about the origins of cancer
, based on the work of other scientists. His hypotheses about pleomorphism and cancer have now been disproved by science and have only some historical importance today. Some of his concepts are however still popular in complementary medicine. A controversial blood test
is named after him: dark field microscopy according to Enderlein.
and got his PhD in 1898 as a zoologist. He became professor in 1924. First he worked as assistant at the Museum für Naturkunde in Berlin, and went later to Szczecin
, now in Poland
but at that time in Germany. During the First World War
he worked as a military surgeon major even though he was a biologist, as there were not enough physicians available at that time. He returned to Berlin in 1919 and remained there until 1937. After 1933 he became production manager in a small pharmaceutical company: Sanum (that later became Sanum-Kehlbeck). In 1944 he founded his own pharmaceutical company IBICA in Berlin, transferred later to Hamburg. He was also the publisher of a newspaper called Akmon. After his death, IBICA and Sanum merged in 1975 to form the Sanum-Kehlbeck company which is still active today.
and systematics
of many Diptera
families. Many insects were named by him and some still carry his name. His way of distinction by external characteristics led to some disputes inside the scientific community of that time (see Zwick 1995 for details). Enderlein was mostly interested in the fly family, Simuliidae
.
In 1916 he published an article about spotted fever.
s. The concept of pleomorphism was quite controversial at the end of the 19th and the beginning of the 20th century. Eventually the monomorphism concept of Louis Pasteur
was accepted by the scientific community.
The term pleomorphism comes from the Greek
pleion = more, morphe = figure, and was apparently created by French chemist and biologist Antoine Béchamp
(1816–1908). Similar concepts were known in ancient times as concepts of abiogenesis
but these were disproved during the 18th century.
Based on the early work of Béchamp, who was an opponent of Louis Pasteur, and based on a point of view of contemporary Wilhelm von Brehmer (1883–1958), and on on his own microscopic observation, he developed his own complicated pleomorphism hypothesis
. He was convinced that every microorganism would pass through a particular development-cycle, that he called cyclode (bacterial cyclode). Bechamp had issued earlier the opinion that in every animal or plant cell there were small particles, that he called microzymas or granulations moleculaires. These particles were able to transform into pathogen bacteria under certain circumstances. Pasteur and the scientific community did not accept this opinion.
At that time it was also known that plasmodia
(the causal agents of malaria) were able to change form during their different developmental stages.
In 1925 Enderlein published his main work: Bakterien-Cyklogenie. He developed not only a complex hypothesis, but at the same time he created also his own terminology that makes reading his papers difficult or even impossible. He stated that small harmless and beneficial herbal particles were present in every animal or plant which may transform into larger and pathogen bacteria or fungi
under certain circumstances. The smallest particles are called protits
, symbionts
or endobionts
. Protits are, according to Enderlein, small colloid
s of protein
s, sized between 1 and 10 nm. Enderlein distinguished between acid and alkaline symbionts. These particles are able to be transmitted via the placenta
before birth.
Enderlein was convinced that these small particles were harmless and necessary for health. Only the larger organisms developed out of these particles were pathogenic bacteria or fungi, Enderlein uses the word valent for pathogen. The smaller harmless particles are able to interact and to control the larger valent particles or organisms by their ability to destroy them by a process of merging. After death the smallest particles survive and may serve for another host-organism, and they participate in the process of decomposition
.
A disturbance of the symbiotic friendly coexistence between the smaller particles and the larger organism would start a dangerous situation he called mochlosis that leads at the end to a disease, facilitated by a wrong way of thinking and living. In such a case, he speaks about an increase of valenz, the most primitive protits would build up one-dimensional chains, called filit. These filits may build up a two dimensional and later three dimensional net of filits. But this only at a pH higher than 7.3. In a healthy ambiance, such a filit-net may never build up. The filit-net leads to larger particle: the symprotits and later the chondrits. These chondrits have more or less the size of a virus with 15-300 nm in size. The dark field microscopy is able to show them, says Enderlein. If this process continues, we will observe larger particles called mychits, or bacteria-nuclei forming the basis of a bacterium.
(other named stages are: basit, phytit, rhabdit, cystit, linit, ascit, synascit.)
According to Enderlein, the different diseases of man are related to particular cyclodes leading to particular microorganisms. He was mainly interested in two cyclodes: the cyclode leading to the fungus Mucor racemosus
and the cyclode leading to the fungus Aspergillus niger
. The mucor racemosus cyclode leads to diseases concerning the blood, spine and rheumatism. In these cases a marcant filit-net should always be present. An injection of harmless symbionts may help here as they are able to destroy larger valent microorganisms.
The Aspergillus niger cyclode leads to diseases of lung, tuberculosis and cancer. In this case, an injection of symbionts may be helpful.
Enderlein was convinced that bacteria may increase in number or by asexual
division or by another sexual way of merging the two nuclei before division.
Developed bacteria and fungi may regress or downgrade back to harmless particles, but this process is only possible in a healthy host organism. He believed the use of some catalytic acting drugs might support that process: the chondritins.
Germany
Germany , officially the Federal Republic of Germany , is a federal parliamentary republic in Europe. The country consists of 16 states while the capital and largest city is Berlin. Germany covers an area of 357,021 km2 and has a largely temperate seasonal climate...
zoologist, entomologist and later a manufacturer of pharmaceutical products. Enderlein got some international renown because of his insect research but in Germany he became famous because of his concept of the pleomorphism of microorganisms and his hypotheses
Hypothesis
A hypothesis is a proposed explanation for a phenomenon. The term derives from the Greek, ὑποτιθέναι – hypotithenai meaning "to put under" or "to suppose". For a hypothesis to be put forward as a scientific hypothesis, the scientific method requires that one can test it...
about the origins of cancer
Cancer
Cancer , known medically as a malignant neoplasm, is a large group of different diseases, all involving unregulated cell growth. In cancer, cells divide and grow uncontrollably, forming malignant tumors, and invade nearby parts of the body. The cancer may also spread to more distant parts of the...
, based on the work of other scientists. His hypotheses about pleomorphism and cancer have now been disproved by science and have only some historical importance today. Some of his concepts are however still popular in complementary medicine. A controversial blood test
Blood test
A blood test is a laboratory analysis performed on a blood sample that is usually extracted from a vein in the arm using a needle, or via fingerprick....
is named after him: dark field microscopy according to Enderlein.
Life
Enderlein was born in Leipzig, the son of a teacher. He studied in Leipzig and BerlinBerlin
Berlin is the capital city of Germany and is one of the 16 states of Germany. With a population of 3.45 million people, Berlin is Germany's largest city. It is the second most populous city proper and the seventh most populous urban area in the European Union...
and got his PhD in 1898 as a zoologist. He became professor in 1924. First he worked as assistant at the Museum für Naturkunde in Berlin, and went later to Szczecin
Szczecin
Szczecin , is the capital city of the West Pomeranian Voivodeship in Poland. It is the country's seventh-largest city and the largest seaport in Poland on the Baltic Sea. As of June 2009 the population was 406,427....
, now in Poland
Poland
Poland , officially the Republic of Poland , is a country in Central Europe bordered by Germany to the west; the Czech Republic and Slovakia to the south; Ukraine, Belarus and Lithuania to the east; and the Baltic Sea and Kaliningrad Oblast, a Russian exclave, to the north...
but at that time in Germany. During the First World War
World War I
World War I , which was predominantly called the World War or the Great War from its occurrence until 1939, and the First World War or World War I thereafter, was a major war centred in Europe that began on 28 July 1914 and lasted until 11 November 1918...
he worked as a military surgeon major even though he was a biologist, as there were not enough physicians available at that time. He returned to Berlin in 1919 and remained there until 1937. After 1933 he became production manager in a small pharmaceutical company: Sanum (that later became Sanum-Kehlbeck). In 1944 he founded his own pharmaceutical company IBICA in Berlin, transferred later to Hamburg. He was also the publisher of a newspaper called Akmon. After his death, IBICA and Sanum merged in 1975 to form the Sanum-Kehlbeck company which is still active today.
Scientific work
Enderlein published more than 500 scientific articles, mostly about insects. He worked in taxonomyTaxonomy
Taxonomy is the science of identifying and naming species, and arranging them into a classification. The field of taxonomy, sometimes referred to as "biological taxonomy", revolves around the description and use of taxonomic units, known as taxa...
and systematics
Systematics
Biological systematics is the study of the diversification of terrestrial life, both past and present, and the relationships among living things through time. Relationships are visualized as evolutionary trees...
of many Diptera
Fly
True flies are insects of the order Diptera . They possess a pair of wings on the mesothorax and a pair of halteres, derived from the hind wings, on the metathorax...
families. Many insects were named by him and some still carry his name. His way of distinction by external characteristics led to some disputes inside the scientific community of that time (see Zwick 1995 for details). Enderlein was mostly interested in the fly family, Simuliidae
Black fly
A black fly is any member of the family Simuliidae of the Culicomorpha infraorder. They are related to the Ceratopogonidae, Chironomidae, and Thaumaleidae. There are over 1,800 known species of black flies . Most species belong to the immense genus Simulium...
.
In 1916 he published an article about spotted fever.
Theories on pleomorphism and the origins of diseases
He caused more sensation, however, when he developed and published his concepts about the pleomorphism of microorganismMicroorganism
A microorganism or microbe is a microscopic organism that comprises either a single cell , cell clusters, or no cell at all...
s. The concept of pleomorphism was quite controversial at the end of the 19th and the beginning of the 20th century. Eventually the monomorphism concept of Louis Pasteur
Louis Pasteur
Louis Pasteur was a French chemist and microbiologist born in Dole. He is remembered for his remarkable breakthroughs in the causes and preventions of diseases. His discoveries reduced mortality from puerperal fever, and he created the first vaccine for rabies and anthrax. His experiments...
was accepted by the scientific community.
The term pleomorphism comes from the Greek
Greek language
Greek is an independent branch of the Indo-European family of languages. Native to the southern Balkans, it has the longest documented history of any Indo-European language, spanning 34 centuries of written records. Its writing system has been the Greek alphabet for the majority of its history;...
pleion = more, morphe = figure, and was apparently created by French chemist and biologist Antoine Béchamp
Antoine Béchamp
Pierre Jacques Antoine Béchamp was a French biologist. He studied silkworm parasites, and was the first to synthesise Atoxyl.-Biography:...
(1816–1908). Similar concepts were known in ancient times as concepts of abiogenesis
Abiogenesis
Abiogenesis or biopoesis is the study of how biological life arises from inorganic matter through natural processes, and the method by which life on Earth arose...
but these were disproved during the 18th century.
Based on the early work of Béchamp, who was an opponent of Louis Pasteur, and based on a point of view of contemporary Wilhelm von Brehmer (1883–1958), and on on his own microscopic observation, he developed his own complicated pleomorphism hypothesis
Hypothesis
A hypothesis is a proposed explanation for a phenomenon. The term derives from the Greek, ὑποτιθέναι – hypotithenai meaning "to put under" or "to suppose". For a hypothesis to be put forward as a scientific hypothesis, the scientific method requires that one can test it...
. He was convinced that every microorganism would pass through a particular development-cycle, that he called cyclode (bacterial cyclode). Bechamp had issued earlier the opinion that in every animal or plant cell there were small particles, that he called microzymas or granulations moleculaires. These particles were able to transform into pathogen bacteria under certain circumstances. Pasteur and the scientific community did not accept this opinion.
At that time it was also known that plasmodia
Plasmodium
Plasmodium is a genus of parasitic protists. Infection by these organisms is known as malaria. The genus Plasmodium was described in 1885 by Ettore Marchiafava and Angelo Celli. Currently over 200 species of this genus are recognized and new species continue to be described.Of the over 200 known...
(the causal agents of malaria) were able to change form during their different developmental stages.
In 1925 Enderlein published his main work: Bakterien-Cyklogenie. He developed not only a complex hypothesis, but at the same time he created also his own terminology that makes reading his papers difficult or even impossible. He stated that small harmless and beneficial herbal particles were present in every animal or plant which may transform into larger and pathogen bacteria or fungi
Fungus
A fungus is a member of a large group of eukaryotic organisms that includes microorganisms such as yeasts and molds , as well as the more familiar mushrooms. These organisms are classified as a kingdom, Fungi, which is separate from plants, animals, and bacteria...
under certain circumstances. The smallest particles are called protits
Mycoplasma
Mycoplasma refers to a genus of bacteria that lack a cell wall. Without a cell wall, they are unaffected by many common antibiotics such as penicillin or other beta-lactam antibiotics that target cell wall synthesis. They can be parasitic or saprotrophic. Several species are pathogenic in humans,...
, symbionts
Symbiosis
Symbiosis is close and often long-term interaction between different biological species. In 1877 Bennett used the word symbiosis to describe the mutualistic relationship in lichens...
or endobionts
Mycoplasma
Mycoplasma refers to a genus of bacteria that lack a cell wall. Without a cell wall, they are unaffected by many common antibiotics such as penicillin or other beta-lactam antibiotics that target cell wall synthesis. They can be parasitic or saprotrophic. Several species are pathogenic in humans,...
. Protits are, according to Enderlein, small colloid
Colloid
A colloid is a substance microscopically dispersed evenly throughout another substance.A colloidal system consists of two separate phases: a dispersed phase and a continuous phase . A colloidal system may be solid, liquid, or gaseous.Many familiar substances are colloids, as shown in the chart below...
s of protein
Protein
Proteins are biochemical compounds consisting of one or more polypeptides typically folded into a globular or fibrous form, facilitating a biological function. A polypeptide is a single linear polymer chain of amino acids bonded together by peptide bonds between the carboxyl and amino groups of...
s, sized between 1 and 10 nm. Enderlein distinguished between acid and alkaline symbionts. These particles are able to be transmitted via the placenta
Placenta
The placenta is an organ that connects the developing fetus to the uterine wall to allow nutrient uptake, waste elimination, and gas exchange via the mother's blood supply. "True" placentas are a defining characteristic of eutherian or "placental" mammals, but are also found in some snakes and...
before birth.
Enderlein was convinced that these small particles were harmless and necessary for health. Only the larger organisms developed out of these particles were pathogenic bacteria or fungi, Enderlein uses the word valent for pathogen. The smaller harmless particles are able to interact and to control the larger valent particles or organisms by their ability to destroy them by a process of merging. After death the smallest particles survive and may serve for another host-organism, and they participate in the process of decomposition
Decomposition
Decomposition is the process by which organic material is broken down into simpler forms of matter. The process is essential for recycling the finite matter that occupies physical space in the biome. Bodies of living organisms begin to decompose shortly after death...
.
A disturbance of the symbiotic friendly coexistence between the smaller particles and the larger organism would start a dangerous situation he called mochlosis that leads at the end to a disease, facilitated by a wrong way of thinking and living. In such a case, he speaks about an increase of valenz, the most primitive protits would build up one-dimensional chains, called filit. These filits may build up a two dimensional and later three dimensional net of filits. But this only at a pH higher than 7.3. In a healthy ambiance, such a filit-net may never build up. The filit-net leads to larger particle: the symprotits and later the chondrits. These chondrits have more or less the size of a virus with 15-300 nm in size. The dark field microscopy is able to show them, says Enderlein. If this process continues, we will observe larger particles called mychits, or bacteria-nuclei forming the basis of a bacterium.
- Apathogenic forms within a cyclode are: protit, filium, filit, spermit, symprotit, chondrit, microchondrit
- Pathogenic forms (dynamovalent) are: makrosymprotit, makrochondrit, sporoid symprotit, filitnet, mychit (bacterial nucleus), cystit, thecit, diökothecit, bacteria, streptococcusStreptococcusStreptococcus is a genus of spherical Gram-positive bacteria belonging to the phylum Firmicutes and the lactic acid bacteria group. Cellular division occurs along a single axis in these bacteria, and thus they grow in chains or pairs, hence the name — from Greek στρεπτος streptos, meaning...
, staphylococus, Mycobacterium tuberculosisMycobacterium tuberculosisMycobacterium tuberculosis is a pathogenic bacterial species in the genus Mycobacterium and the causative agent of most cases of tuberculosis . First discovered in 1882 by Robert Koch, M...
, amoebit, zoit.
(other named stages are: basit, phytit, rhabdit, cystit, linit, ascit, synascit.)
According to Enderlein, the different diseases of man are related to particular cyclodes leading to particular microorganisms. He was mainly interested in two cyclodes: the cyclode leading to the fungus Mucor racemosus
Mucor racemosus
Mucor racemosus is a fungal plant pathogen.Mucor racemosus has been known cause allergic reactions among some people. The fungus has been isolated in soft cheese Camembert.- External links :...
and the cyclode leading to the fungus Aspergillus niger
Aspergillus niger
Aspergillus niger is a fungus and one of the most common species of the genus Aspergillus. It causes a disease called black mold on certain fruits and vegetables such as grapes, onions, and peanuts, and is a common contaminant of food...
. The mucor racemosus cyclode leads to diseases concerning the blood, spine and rheumatism. In these cases a marcant filit-net should always be present. An injection of harmless symbionts may help here as they are able to destroy larger valent microorganisms.
The Aspergillus niger cyclode leads to diseases of lung, tuberculosis and cancer. In this case, an injection of symbionts may be helpful.
Enderlein was convinced that bacteria may increase in number or by asexual
Asexual reproduction
Asexual reproduction is a mode of reproduction by which offspring arise from a single parent, and inherit the genes of that parent only, it is reproduction which does not involve meiosis, ploidy reduction, or fertilization. A more stringent definition is agamogenesis which is reproduction without...
division or by another sexual way of merging the two nuclei before division.
Developed bacteria and fungi may regress or downgrade back to harmless particles, but this process is only possible in a healthy host organism. He believed the use of some catalytic acting drugs might support that process: the chondritins.