On the relation between the Institut für Meereskunde in Berlin and the Biologische Anstalt Helgoland

Abstract

The “Institut für Meereskunde” (IfM) in Berlin, founded in 1900, first took up marine biology as a section of its museum, in which emphasis was placed on the environment and the components of local ecosystems rather than on extraordinary species. The first joint research project of the Biologische Anstalt Helgoland (BAH) and the IfM in Berlin was instigated by the physicist A. Merz; it included several time-series of hydrographical and biological samples at fixed stations (light vessels) in the German Bight. When plans were made to establish a biological station in Constantinople during World War I, the colleagues in Berlin tried to change it into an integrated physicalbiological station, in which biological research would concentrate on revealing the laws of nature rather than simply describing the biosphere. During the recession after the war, the Prussian government was anxious to unite both institutions in order to save money. However, Mielck of the BAH succeeded in preventing the take-over by the Institute in Berlin. The relation between the two institutes stayed cool up to the destruction of the latter in 1945.