Dear readers of „
In this editorial, we regret that we have to announce the death of four persons, who all had a special relationship to tobacco science and also to our
Obituaries of Professors Franz Adlkofer and Elmar Richter are printed below.
On March 30th, 2022, Professor Ulrich Mohr passed away at the age of 91. He was a renowned pathologist at the Veterinarian University of Hanover and a co-founder of the Fraunhofer Institute of Toxicology and Experimental Medicine (ITEM) in Hanover. Ulrich Mohr worked for more than four decades on the
On 21st June of this year, Mrs. Ilse Hoffmann passed away. Together with her husband, the late Dr Dietrich Hoffmann, she published a number of milestone papers on the analysis of tobacco smoke and the changing cigarette, some of them also in this
Wolf-Dieter Heller
Gerhard Scherer
EDITORS
It is our sad duty to inform our readers that Professor Franz Adlkofer died in Paros, Greece on June 18th, 2022 at the age of 86. For us, this sad news came unexpectedly, since from our phone calls several weeks before his death, we got the impression that Franz was physically and mentally in comparatively good health.
Franz Adlkofer studied medicine at Ludwig-Maximilians-University (LMU) Munich and completed his doctorate in 1966 at the Max-Planck-Institute for Biochemistry in Munich with Nobel Laureate Professor Adolf Butenandt acting as one of his supervisors. Between 1965 and 1976 Franz Adlkofer qualified as an internist and habilitated in 1974 at Freie Universität (FU) Berlin.
In September 1976, Professor Franz Adlkofer became director of the scientific department of the Verband der Cigarettenindustrie (VdC) in Hamburg, Germany. He also took over the position of a Scientific Secretary of the Research Council on Smoking and Health, later (1992) transferred to the Stiftung Verhalten und Umwelt (VERUM Foundation), of which Franz Adlkofer became director. Both of us started our collaboration with Franz Adlkofer in 1978, as internal research assistant (GS) and as external statistical advisor for research projects (WDH). Shortly afterwards (in 1980), a research laboratory was established in Munich under the leadership of Professor Helmut Schievelbein, a famous nicotine researcher in Germany, whom Adlkofer succeeded as head of the Munich laboratory in 1986. In these three functions, which he held until 1995, Professor Franz Adlkofer followed a clear and exclusively science-driven strategy with two focus areas: the less harmful cigarette (LHC) and nicotine. A third field of research, which was mainly imposed from outside was the issue of passive smoking (exposure of non-smokers to environmental tobacco smoke, ETS). Adlkofer was convinced that nicotine was central for the use of tobacco products and that harm-reduced products should provide sufficient nicotine to the user and as low levels as possible only of toxicants. For this strategy, it was necessary to investigate all aspects of nicotine, in particular its toxicological and pharmacological effects. In his roles as a secretary of the Research Council on Smoking and Health and director of the VERUM Foundation, he organized two outstanding conferences entitled
Professor Franz Adlkofer served as the editor of “
We both owe Franz Adlkofer a lot in our careers. In particular, his approach of clearly defining a target and trying to achieve it with the best (technical and scientific) methods available is mostly successful, even if sometimes apparently unsurmountable obstacles have to be overcome. Franz Adlkofer is survived by his wife Karin, four children (Michael, Kathrin, Carsten, Julia) and 10 grandchildren. Those who met him will remember Franz Adlkofer as a strong character, who vehemently followed his scientifically-deduced convictions, but who also was a warmhearted person towards those he liked and trusted in.
Wolf-Dieter Heller
Gerhard Scherer
It is our sad duty to inform our readers that Professor Elmar Richter passed away on June 8th, 2022 at the age of 77. Franky, as he was known by his friends worldwide, finally succumbed to a cancer disease, which he was able to successfully combat with great optimism for more than three years. Until the end, Franky was active as an animal welfare officer for studies at Ludwig-Maximilians-University Munich (LMU). We as editors of
Elmar Richter studied veterinary medicine at LMU and earned his doctoral degree in 1974. He habilitated at the Institute for Pharmacology, Toxicology and Pharmacy at the Veterinary Faculty of LMU with investigations on metabolism of nitrosamines in rats in 1988.
We both came into contact with Professor med. vet. Richter by end of the 1980ies, when his work on tobacco-specific nitrosamines was funded by the German Research Council on Smoking and Health. In the 25 years to follow, TSNA metabolism in various organs
Franky Richter was one of the few and far between scientists in academics who did not shy away from cooperating with scientists working in the tobacco industry. The only precondition for him was that this cooperation must be exclusively based on scientific facts. We know of no serious scientist, who could not accept this prerequisite. Not surprisingly, Professor Richter had to withstand hostilities from parts of the scientific community and the public. However, Franky never became shaky and stood to his convictions.
Franky Richter accepted our invitation to become a member of the Advisory Board of our
Franky is survived by his wife Steffi and his son Basti. All who met him will have warm-hearted recollections of Franky as a humorous and cordial person as well as a sound and excellent scientist.
Wolf-Dieter Heller
Gerhard Scherer