BERGMANN, MAX

BERGMANN, MAX (1886–1944), chemist, best known for his research in leathers. Bergmann was born in Fuerth, Bavaria. He obtained his doctorate in 1911 at Berlin, where he became the assistant to the organic chemist Emil Fischer. In 1920, Bergmann was appointed head of chemistry at the Kaiser-Wilhelm Institut fuer Faserstoff-Forschung in Berlin, and in 1921, director of the Kaiser-Wilhelm Institut fuer Lederforschung in Dresden and professor of the Technische Hochschule there. He held these positions until forced to leave Germany in 1934. His main area of research was in the chemistry and structure of proteins. Bergmann went to the United States where he became a member of the Rockefeller Institute for Medical Research. -BIBLIOGRAPHY: Journal of the Chemical Society (1945), 716–8; H.T. Clarke, in: Science, 102 (1945), 168–70; J.C. Poggendorff, Biographisch-litterarisches Handwoerterbuch der exakten Naturwissenschaften, 7B (1967), 335–7. (Samuel Aaron Miller)