Munk, Hermann

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MUNK, HERMANN

MUNK, HERMANN (1839–1912), German physiologist; a pioneer in the field of cerebral physiology. Munk was a director of the physiological laboratory of the Veterinary School in Berlin and a member of the German Academy of Science. He studied the localization centers in the brain and his name is associated with the so-called visual sphere of the cerebrum. He also did research on the function of the thyroid gland and studied the mechanism of motion. His younger brother immanuel munk (1852–1900), was also a physiologist. He was his brother's assistant and then taught at the Physiological Institute of Berlin University (professor from 1899).

Munk and Nathan Zuntz did research in the field of metabolism and nutrition, with particular emphasis on the function of the kidneys. He wrote Physiologie des Menschen und der Saeugetiere (1881) and co-edited Zentralblatt fuer die Medizinischen Wissenschaften.

bibliography:

S.R. Kagan, Jewish Medicine (1952), 163f., 168f.; Biographisches Lexikon der hervorragenden Aerzte, 2 (1933).

[Suessmann Muntner]