Lynen, Feodor

Lynen, Feodor (fāō`dôr lē`nən), 1911–79, German biochemist, grad. Univ. of Munich (Ph.D. 1937). He began teaching at the Max Planck Institute for Cell Chemistry in Munich in 1947. His research on the B vitamin called biotin, the basic function of which is to regulate carbon-dioxide usage by cells, led to work on the mechanism and regulation of cholesterol and fatty-acid metabolism for which he shared the 1964 Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine with K. E. Bloch.

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Lynen, Feodor 

Born Apr. 6, 1911, in Munich. German biochemist. Member of the Leopoldina German Academy of Naturalists (1959) and the US National Academy of Sciences (1962).

Lynen graduated as a doctor of philosophy from the University of Munich in 1937. He has been director of the Max Planck Society Institute of Cell Chemistry in Munich since 1954. His principal works deal with the biochemistry of metabolism, the oxidation of fatty acids in the body, and the activation of acetate. Together with K. Bloch, Lynen was awarded the Nobel Prize in 1964 for research on the biosynthesis of cholesterol and fatty acids.