| Description | This is the first of two interviews given by Hans Kosterlitz. MS3620/1/35 and MS3620/1/37
Recorded on 25 November, 1985 by Elizabeth Olson.
The transcript was corrected by Dr Gordon Lees who has added some additional notes for clarity. These appear in square brackets or as footnotes
Transcript of interview:
O Professor Kosterlitz, where were you born?
HK In Berlin.
O And were you educated there?
HK As far as school education is concerned?
O Yes.
HK Yes. University education I was for one semester (of course in Germany the semester is not a term,) in Heidelberg; next summer in Freibourg. After that I studied in Berlin where I got a medical degree.
O Did you take an Arts degree before Medicine?
HK No.
O At what stage did you decide to study Medicine?
HK Now, this is a very interesting question because what I really wanted to do was, that is before I went to university, I really wanted to do Theoretical Physics (which actually my son is doing now; he is a professor of Theoretical Physics in Providence) but my father said to me at that time, it was 1921 or 22 something like this, he said: 'Well, Theoretical Physics, you can't do that unless you marry a rich woman...'
O Really?
HK Because there is no money, in other words. So I said: 'Well, I really want to do Medicine...' He was a medical man, he said: '..and in no circumstances would I like you to follow my footsteps in Medicine, what about taking the Law?' So I said: 'Well, I don't mind. I will try it for one semester.' I didn't do the proper courses, I did some law courses but mainly of the history of law and then after the end of the semester, said to my father: 'Now I have done what you wanted me to do, and now I'm going to do Medicine.'
O Yes. And did you see yourself as a research man at that stage or were you going to be a surgeon or...?
HK Ah. That's very difficult to say. I was remembering my last years at school. I was interested in Biology and I do remember I was in a way a very naughty boy, because I had a text book on Biology which I opened behind the back of another boy in front of me so that the teacher couldn't see it, since I was bored with what I was taught. So I think even then I was interested in this area more than the theoretical aspects, not necessarily as a researcher, because I think nobody was in research in those days.
O No, I see, and what did studying Medicine in Germany entail? Was it a five year course?
HK I'm trying to remember. I think it was a five or six year course, and I cannot remember. It is, of course, very different from education in this country because you had to take one or two compulsory, not subjects, but parts of a subject. For instance, I had to do practical anatomy. I had also to do some practical classes in physiology. But in those days it was really almost like the medieval days, that what you did, you went to the department where you wanted to be taught, because in Berlin there were several universities at this point and you could move from one to another…
O Really?
HK Yes, because it was a University of Berlin, so you could move between subdivisions of the various… Well, in Berlin as far as I can remember there were four departments of anatomy, in different places.
O And you could choose....?
HK Well, what you did was you went to one and you had to take a book, and you handed in the book to the secretary and she gave it to the professor and he initialled it. That is all you really needed to do to be there. There was no control whatsoever of whether you attended or not. Except for the practical classes, when you had to go and get a signature of the professor or some of his assistants.
O But you would be examined at the end of the time in what you knew?
HK No.
O No?
HK No. We were examined in the end of, now this is what I cannot remember exactly, whether it was, I think it was two and a half or three years, it was one examination in which you have to do zoology, botany, anatomy, histology, and physiology, but you were never asked before. There were no class examinations. Nothing whatsoever. And at the end of that you either passed the examination or you didn't. But you had to pass the examination to be allowed to go on to clinical work. That was known as the pre-clinical examination.
O I see, yes.
HK But you had to take the subjects together, you weren't allowed to do it one day then… Some people did that; they failed one subject and had to repeat it. That was the same in the clinical subjects, you never had class examinations…
O Really?
HK Definitely not, in those days, I cannot tell you what is now. You had almost absolute liberty of what you did or what you didn't do, provided you passed the examination. And attended some clinics.
O Yes. Did you speak fluent English then?
HK I wouldn't like to say that I spoke fluent English, but when I was a boy of, I forget, it must be twelve years or so, we had a Scottish young lady staying with us and she taught me English and so that is how I learned the rudiments of English. It made it much easier, later on, to pick it up.
O Yes, I'm sure
[Break in tape]
HK .... After I'd done my clinical examination I started to become interested in research, and I told you that you could arrange your attendance or non-attendance, at your free will, provided you got the signup of the professor for each subject. And what I did was, I wanted to learn more biochemistry and particularly physical chemistry as far as one could do it, if one wasn't a student of chemistry per se. And what I did was, I decided for the first term after my pre-clinical examination, I would attend a department, now I can't remember now what it was called, the head of the department was a man Rona, and is a very well known department for people who were medical people who wanted to learn more biochemistry and particularly physical chemistry, and what I did was, I did my clinical work, attending the lectures and so on from 8 to 11 in the morning and after that I went to that department and worked in the laboratory, at first until it was closed at about 6 o'clock or so, but then the professor thought he wouldn't mind giving me the key for the department so I very often worked until midnight. That is how I learned my basic sciences.
O And that was all studying what was known at the time, rather than extending the field of knowledge?
HK Well, it was at the field, but there were, of course, people in the department who were research workers. You got in touch with them, you heard, you learned what they were doing, you see, but you had to learn the basic aspects first...
O Yes, sounds very stimulating.
HK Oh, it was very stimulating.
O And did you ever practise, in the clinical sense?
HK [Pause] Well, that needs some explanation. After I passed my clinical examination, there was a compulsory one-year practical session of surgery, just the same as it is here, although it was quite early, that was in '25 or '26. And after that I tried to get a post where I could stay and do clinical work and do research and what happened was that I got a room, for which I think I had to pay something, I forget now, but I was then called a Voluntary Assistant and I stayed, it was in the Charité‚ in Berlin, I think it must have been about '26, well, until the Nazis came, that was '33. And I actually did practical clinical medicine and at the same time continued to do research.
O Yes. That would have been a post as Assistant in the First Medical Department in the University of Berlin, from 1928 to '33? Is that right?
HK Well, at first it was a voluntary position. There was, what was it, did you have? [Reads notes]
O I just got it from a Who's Who.
H Yes, I know.
O First Medical Department in the University of Berlin, called an Assistant, '28-'33.
HK '28. That's right, now, it brings back to my mind, five years then. But I started in '25, but then I didn't get anything. After that, I mean I had to pay for the room actually, after that I got a salary of - how would you call it? But it scarcely exists here in this country, it is the first or second year after you get through the examinations. And, but you see I only could get it if I…, I couldn't get it in the department of Medicine, but I was always interested in X-ray investigations and (now I didn't get quite the right word for what I wanted to say but it doesn't matter) and during my clinical work, it was very different from here in this respect, I was responsible for a patient and the nurse took the patient down to the X-ray room and I examined her, not the radiologist examined her, but I examined her, but if I had problems the radiologist would just come and help. That was after about a year or two and after that the radiologist said: 'Why don't you want to take up a job here?' They put me in charge of the X-ray department of the outpatients, diagnostic outpatients. And that was for, must have been three years, I'm not quite sure, where I learned a great deal of X-ray, diagnostic X-ray, and then I went back to the clinical department but then it was almost shortly after that Hitler…
O Started? What was the subject of your M.D. thesis? Was it in X-ray?
HK Oh no. It was a very biochemical thing. Now you're asking me a question which I cannot answer because it's such a long time ago.
O Well we can get it inserted, it doesn't matter, but it was…?
HK It was you could either call it biochemistry or pharmacology… The action of… well, I'd better leave that, we can insert that.
O Yes, alright, we can insert that. And was your Ph.D. on something similar, it was about the same time?
HK Oh, no, no, no. My MD was much earlier, it was '28 wasn't it?
O Yes, '29… Oh, PhD '36, sorry.
HK The Ph.D. was a completely different story. I think we are now finished as far as this aspect of Berlin is concerned.
O Yes. So then why did you apply to go to the University of Aberdeen, and change your field?
HK Well, I didn't change my field because I didn't tell you the whole story.
O Sorry
HK So you don't know.
O Well, come on then.
HK While I had to do the X-ray in order to get a salary, so I got interested in it. You see that X-ray was from 9 to 1 in the morning. In the afternoon, I arranged with one of the clinical units - what would you call it here?
O Departments?
HK Well it wasn't a department, you see, it was a ward
O Ah yes.
HK With a head of the ward that… I wanted to follow up some work which I had started, namely, it was on carbohydrate metabolism, and particularly on the action of galactose, and I asked him: 'Would you give me a number of beds in your ward?' Five or six beds I think I asked for at that time, in which I could investigate liver disease, and also particularly the action of galactose in normal people and in patients with liver disease. That was at a time when I did X-ray work in the morning, and this in the afternoon and I had a young technician who did a lot of the analytical work. So what it really meant, of course, that the day was a very long day and I still remember I quite often, - I was a young man so in the evenings, other things had to be done - and I came home and I had to finish the analysis you see. That was quite often about 11 o'clock at night or 12 midnight…
O So you formed the habit of working long days at that stage?
HK Yes, yes. You see my technician had to prepare everything. I only had to do the final reading. So that was in those days… At that time, I got interested in something which was very important for me afterwards, namely the metabolism of galactose. Now, as you probably know, galactose is converted into glucose in the human body.
O Yes, explain it for the tape.
HK The chemistry of how it happens was, of course, completely unknown. It was then that I got really interested: what can I do? What can one do about it? In that time, I read a great deal of Professor MacLeod's work. I mean, he was one of the co-discoverers of insulin in that time. Who had had just come back from Toronto to Aberdeen to take up the Chair of the Physiology Department, and I said to him: 'That is what I really wanted to do'. And he said, 'oh this is too biochemical, let's do something different'. So I did some other experiments with him.
O While you were still in Berlin?
HK No. That was in here.
O Here, when you had moved to Aberdeen?
HK Yes, Aberdeen, that was in Aberdeen. I was in Professor MacLeod's department.
O I see, so you applied to join Professor MacLeod, that was what attracted you to Aberdeen?
HK Yes. Because of the type of work which he had…
O Which shared your interest?
HK Which shared my interest and so… Of course in those days there were a fair number of people who wanted to get jobs outside Germany, you see.
O Yes, I'm sure.
HK And, MacLeod felt he was interested in what I was trying to do, and so he invited me to come - provided I didn't expect any salary.
O So your first job in Aberdeen was unpaid?
HK Well, the first nine months I got… I found out how much the salary of an assistant was here, which was £250 per annum. I said to my father: 'Could you afford that for nine months?'
O Really?
HK And so he kept me for nine months, and then I got money from one of the charitable institutions, in this country until I was appointed an Assistant, now you must do, when I was appointed an Assistant.
O Yes, now the dates for that. You were an Assistant and a Carnegie Teaching Fellow from 1936, having been here since 1934, I think?
HK 1934, yes. That is where I got money from, charitable…
O From the Carnegie?
HK No, it wasn't that, I can't even remember…
O Just a trust?
HK It was a trust but I can't remember the exact name but I can find that out. [It was the Diabetic Association.]
O And were you just doing research then or did you have teaching commitments?
HK No, I had no teaching commitments. I was allowed… You see, in those days teaching and that type of research was not the done thing, in those early days. But I went quite often to the hospital and in particular I was particularly interested in the head of the Department of Paediatrics at that time, a Doctor Brown. And the reason why I was interested, he once... I once visited him in his Department and looked at the patients there and I always was interested in the physiognomy of children and adults and I told him that, and he said: 'well this was the kind of thing he is interested in' so we made contact and I visited him almost every Sunday in his, when he looked after his patients...
O Yes, that would have been down in the centre of Aberdeen, at Castlegate?
HK No, the children's department was already up at Foresterhill.
O Ah, yes. They went first, of course.
HK They went first, yes.
O So what did you think of life in Aberdeen when you first came? Do you remember that or didn't it strike you as interesting?
HK Oh, there were lots of interesting things. It is very difficult to… Well I came, I wasn't married and I came by myself and went to a boarding house and stayed there. And I thought life was a bit strange, it was very different. I did enjoy the open fireplaces which we didn't have in Germany. Definitely not, coal was not as easily available, there…
O So you had woodburning stoves?
HK It was, but was very expensive you see. And it was all everywhere central heating, you see. There were some places, one or two friends of mine, they were rather wealthy and they had an open fireplace in addition to the central heating but it was quite unusual.
O So at a boarding house in Aberdeen you felt at least well off in that respect?
HK Oh, I enjoyed it but it was awfully cold.
O I'm sure, because the bedrooms would have been completely unheated at that time?
HK Completely unheated, not only that, the bathroom was not in the building itself...
O Outside, oh dear.
HK No, no. It was built out afterwards and so it was very cold. The only way you could get really, at least I thought the only way I could survive, was I turned on the hot water only, and got all the steam throughout the room, you see.
O Yes, that would be much better.
HK Then, yes, I think we were only allowed one bath a week.
O Probably, yes.
HK Yes, in those days. And then I discovered something very strange, which I still remember. I always liked to read the paper, my newspaper, in bed, when I got to bed, and as most people do I threw it on the floor and I thought there was a strange noise and then I discovered the wind came through the door and lifted the newspaper. That was the kind of thing! And I was absolutely amazed, but being a hardy kind of person because I did a lot of outdoor things I mean I belonged to youth organisations when we stayed for weeks outside in tents or not even in tents. So it didn't worry me, but it was very amusing to get this. At first I didn't know what it was.
O The paper fluttering in the breeze - a draught rather?
HK I didn't know what it was, you see I thought it was some animal coming in.
O Oh dear. Were your colleagues friendly? Did you find it a hospitable place?
HK Oh they were, terribly friendly... I mean, the colleagues in the Department where I worked, they were terribly friendly.
O Good, yes, so that they'd have helped you to settle.
HK More than friendly, almost you know, I mean they were ... yes.
O This is a change of topic again. When you came to Aberdeen all the Medical School would have been in Marischal College - not the patients but all the teaching part of it would have been here?
HK Yes, even the clinical departments were here, yes.
O Did you mind when they took off to Foresterhill and the pre-clinical subjects were left here? Did you think that made any difference to your contacts with people or, by that time you were too well established perhaps?
HK It didn't make any difference to me, no. You see, one didn't see… the only people one saw very often, one saw very much here, of the pre-clinical academic departments were really the, I mean, apart from Anatomy and Physiology of course, there was no Biochemistry in those days, was the Department of Pathology, who I visited very often, but the Department of Obstetrics or Medicine, no. You had, if you wanted to make contact, you had go up to the Medical School which was, of course, in those days not up at Foresterhill, it was...
O Well the hospital part was at Woolmanhill and at Castle Street. Was the Medical School a place of lively research when you came or was it a place where students learned to be competent doctors? Or did you get a general picture?
HK One of the outstanding characteristics of, I think almost any Scottish university, is that teaching is very important and I would have thought even looking back now, that the students were… now better taught is probably the wrong word, were more, carefully taught is also the wrong word, students could not... they felt they had to attend lectures.
O You mean there was more, sort of, pastoral care, that they were expected to pass and people helped them?
HK Yes, it's more than that, it's more than that. In some departments, I know MacLeod didn't like the idea and he didn't do it, and in some departments there was a roll call, as far as students were concerned and… But the Anatomy Department had the roll call for a very long time. Good old Lockhart never stopped it you know?
O Yes he made sure that the students turned up and learned their stuff...
HK Well…
O As far as he could, yes.
HK No there was, MacLeod felt that was not his business. He felt, of course I agreed a hundred percent with him in this respect when I started to teach here, that it is up to the teacher to attract the student and they will come, you see. It mustn't be compulsory. But on the whole, I think if you take the average student, this is quite a difficult subject really, if you take the average student, I don't know what it is now, they are better instructed and trained in this country… of course I haven't been in an English university, medical school…
O No, let's just compare Aberdeen and Berlin.
HK Than say, in a German university where you could either, where, as I explained to you, you signed at the beginning...
O You signed on and then it was up to you ...
HK Well, you could either sign on or in some, I think in Freibourg, you didn't sign on but you signed off. You signed when you left, you see, so that you showed you had been there, one day.
O Yes, my goodness.
HK Now for the average student this is a very good way of doing it. It is also very good for the students below average, provided one of the teachers of the department is prepared and is patient enough to look after these students, because they have to be looked after specially, usually. We had in the Physiology Department fortunately, always one or two people…
O Who liked that?
HK Who liked that. Then you have the problem of the bright students and there is only one way I think you can handle the situation, at least I personally felt this way, that's how I did it. I always taught beyond what the average student required but I always told the students: 'Now this is something which you can listen to, you don't need to remember it, if you don't want to.' And the interesting thing was, that the bright students liked that aspect particularly, and the student for whom some of the advanced parts of science, of course, can be very difficult to understand for a student who is not particularly interested but they learned what was necessary to pass the examination.
O When would you have started to teach in Aberdeen? You came as a research man, would it be about 1936 perhaps?
HK On no, I started to teach quite early. It was…in the practical class I was asked to help immediately…
O Yes, but as an unpaid person as far as the Department was concerned? When did you become an established member of staff?
HK An established member of staff in '39.
O With tenure at that point?
HK Yes, I got, in '39 was tenure. I was, that's what the question you asked, established, you see, otherwise I was a member of the staff in, of course… in 30 - you have it somewhere?
O Yes, sorry [consults notes] in '36, yes.
HK But, you see, in those days, and you may not know, in the Scottish universities it was the Head of the Department who had overall power and he actually was responsible for the payment of his Assistants. In the olden days, in the 18th century, and part of the 19th century, he actually had to find the money.
O Yes, and the students paid didn't they?
HK The students paid and he had also to find money… Then, in the '30s and so on, in my days, the university paid. However, the Professor had the actual power of dismissing…
O A member of staff?
HK A member of staff, or not, because officially he paid, although he didn't pay directly. It was quite interesting but I don't think it was ever used actually, but theoretically it was thought that the Head of the department...
O Could choose his staff?
HK Had absolute power, yes
O My goodness, I didn't know that.
HK And he also had the power to… the other important thing is, before you were an established lecturer, it was the Professor who selected the person whom he wanted, and the Court had to accept it. It wasn't because the Professor paid, of course, so the Court theoretically had nothing to do with it but that was all theory. In fact it didn't work that way, but I don't think a Court ever appointed a person, an Assistant Lecturer, they weren't called Assistant Lecturer, I forget now what they were called, against the wishes of the Professor.
O I see yes. So you were still working on galactose metabolism at this time?
HK That's right, yes.
O And your major discovery was?
HK That galactose-1-phosphate was the important intermediate in the metabolism of galactose, and at that time I learned quite a bit of organic chemistry with some of the colleagues in the department. And actually synthesised galactose-1-phosphate just to see whether, what I isolated from the liver, was identical to what had been synthesised. So I was a little bit of chemist in those days.
O And were you expecting, at that stage, to stay in Aberdeen? I suppose that the war was looming in Germany at the time?
HK Yes, I would... Yes, I don't think at that time... before the war, no I didn't intend to change at all.
O I see, yes, and you eventually married and settled in Aberdeen and you had your own household?
HK Yes.
O Did the outbreak of war affect your career at all? What you were doing in the University?
HK Not, well that's a question of how you define directly. You will remember at that time Hitler and his army invaded France and, of course as you know, the British Army had to come back to this country. And at that point, since we were here in Aberdeen at the North Sea, of course I was interned.
O Really?
HK Oh yes, I was interned in May 1940 and I came back here in September.
O So they only kept you for a few months?
HK Yes. It's... I think… that is very true. When I came back, that was in September, in Liverpool, it was the first air raid I had experienced. It was, you'll remember the summer and early autumn the Germans bombed this country very badly. I think it was one of the…
O Last serious raids
HK Last really serious raids, the Liverpool one
O And were you hurt or just heard it?
HK Just… well, what I recall, one isn't frightened…
O Terrified I should imagine.
HK One isn't frightened, one is just… no, one is not terrified either. One takes protection and just wonders, how do you, would you survive or not?
O Yes. And did you work at all when you were interned or was that impossible?
HK I, wait a minute now, you are asking interesting questions which I am trying to remember. One thing I do remember. Somebody sent up a paper, I think. I don't know whether it was a scientific paper or it was something from..., anyhow, it might have been sent by somebody else, which I should look at as a referee and they sent it to me and it was very interesting because it had to go through all the official channels and there was no secret... in it.
O Yes, and they'd all have been mystified I've no doubt.
HK Well, no, they knew me by then, you see, and as a matter of fact I was treated exceedingly well. I actually became a kind of official there, you see, to help you see.
O But you weren't a British national at that time?
HK No.
O Are you now?
HK Oh, I had applied, but I just missed it, missed it by two or three months.
O Really? But they let you come back in September, presumably because of the heavy teaching commitment in the Department as well as…?
HK Well no, it wasn't only that. There was a body, whom I wish I could remember the name at the moment, I can't, of outstanding scientists in this country, who looked after people who had similar experiences as I had. And they, through the Royal Society, certified that I would be a safe person, who would be helpful. The only restriction I had was, actually even that I don't remember now exactly, there were very few restrictions… I wasn't allowed to visit certain scientific places without special permission, and that special permission was usually given, provided it wasn't war secrets.
O Yes indeed, it would be the formality really as far as...?
HK Yes, I didn't feel there was any real difficulty as far as I, personally, was concerned.
O Yes, well that was...
HK My wife was, of course, we by then had our house and, she was there. She told me a bobby visited her at least once a week if not twice a week, but was always very friendly...
O And polite, yes?
HK More than polite really, very friendly.
O Ah well, it was a bad time. Had you still relatives in Germany? Do you want to talk about that or will we leave that?
HK Well my parents they lived in Oxford, and so did my brother at that time.
O Yes, so that it was better for you. So, before the War, Professor Cruickshank would have been appointed to Physiology in Aberdeen, would he?
HK That is correct, after MacLeod, yes.
O And how did that affect your set-up in the Department? Was he in the same line of interest as yourself or not?
HK Oh, not at all, oh no, no, no, not at all. But we, well, let us see. His main line was not… My main line was different, but we published a few papers together.
O Ah yes.
HK Have you seen my… I think it's over here.
O Professor Cruickshank succeeded to the Department and you did a little bit of work with him? What papers did you publish with him, the war one would be…?
HK Well, here, the one with something about the use of fat by the isolated mammalian heart.
O And you did a little bit on oatmeal in the wartime, at least as a source of food in the war?
HK Yes, that is 1945 disease, the question of whether oatmeal could be utilised without, if it's in excess, without damage
O But you worked more with a Dr Bell, you said?
HK No, no, Dr Bell just.. we had only one paper. No, no, he helped me in learning organic chemistry.
O I see, yes, sorry I got confused about that.
HK No, he didn't really work with me. We had two papers with him.
O I see, but he was just a background source of information perhaps, or little bits that ...
HK Well yes, he… without him I couldn't have done the work, but he didn't do the work. When I was in difficulties I asked him for help.
O I see, yes. So, who was funding your research then at that time?
HK In '37?
O And going through the war?
HK Well, in the early days it was the Diabetic Association. They actually supported me. I was one of the first persons, I think, whom they helped*. I remember even quite recently, I forget what the occasion was, I don't that I had to, I maybe had to write something, I can't remember now, where just because I was one of the first people working with diabetes under that tutelage
O Ah yes, the British Diabetic Association, BDA as they call it, is it?
HK British Diabetic Association.
O I suppose that was about the time when diabetes became treatable?
HK Oh, no, no. That was much earlier. You see diabetes became treatable in 1922, 1921-22. No, no, but one did realise that insulin wasn't the, was a very complicated, I mean the treatment with insulin was much more complicated than was thought at first.
O I see, yes. And did you have any staff who helped you personally? Did you have technicians?
HK In those early days until about… well, let's have a look at the names. You see there is up to here…[looks at list of publications]
O Yes, that's 1933.
HK That is Phil Jordan, he was one, that was one when I was in Germany. Then, when I was in this country, that was still you see, that was done in Germany. This was the first paper in this country which was, MacLeod insisted that I put in the Royal Society. I was very timid because I knew of the high standing of the Royal Society in those days of course, I felt I was far away from it. Then you see this, yes we did some… I was interested in glycogen and Bell helped, Bell and I did some work on that and there we did... that was a very interesting thing because that is highly technical, you see one wants to get, one can't work with galactose if one wants to do any biochemistry, one has to protect it and one tried to do it with acetyl compound and, but Bell already had known that when you put it into position four, it will always move into position one, and you lose it and that is… I said to him, 'I can't do this work'. I tried to do it and so he told me the reason for that is because of the acetyl compound
O I see, so did you have your own technician?
HK No.
O Not at that time.
HK My first, well, even you couldn't call Rosa Campbell a technician because she's a graduate.
O But she was a research worker with you then?
HK Yes, starting in...
O In 1948?
HK Yes.
O And did she remain with you for some time? Sorry, 1945
HK Well, we wrote a review then you see…
O So she must have come in at about the end of the war to help you?
HK Yes, the middle of the war actually, yes.
O So that the University weren't funding your research really?
HK Now that is a very difficult question to answer because as you know the University will pay… The money which is given to the University, to any department, should pay 50% for the teaching of the member of staff and 50% for the research.
O I see yes, so they gave you that much and then you had to...
HK No, well, I didn't… No, no, when I asked for something, I was given money, usually, you see. When there were special things, a special apparatus or special…, for instance I needed a lot of galactose - what happened there was, Cruickshank got it, in these days it was all so simple, Cruickshank telephoned the Medical Research Council and said 'there is a man, Kosterlitz, could you give him, I forget how much it was, £100 or £150 for something, so I got a cheque for £150.
O To pay for your materials, yes.
HK That's how it was done, you see.
O Yes, on a friendly basis almost.
HK On a friendly basis, yes. You know, the official, when I got money officially from the MRC with a formal application, was towards the end of or the middle of the war, when I was particularly interested in nutrition and the effect of, the particular effect of, the amount of proteins which we have in our food, on the composition of the liver cell. That was my war effort.
O And that was still the liver but a different aspect of it - that you were working on?
HK Ah yes, a completely different aspect, yes.
O The war ended. Did you still want to stay on in Aberdeen and feel that you were in a research situation that was allowing you to do the work that you wanted to do?
HK Well, what I really wanted to get at that time... You see I was a lecturer and I think I was made senior lecturer, I forget now when…
O '54 or something…
HK As late as that?
O No, perhaps not… Sorry, senior lecturer '45 till '55.
HK Yes, I thought it was just at the end of the war.
O Yes, that's right.
HK You see, there were no senior lecturers, of course, in those days.
O This was a new appointment wasn't it?
HK No, as I explained to you, in those days, there were lecturers and other people who were paid by the Head of the Department theoretically.
O Ah yes, I see.
HK And senior lecturers were only established as such round about '45.
O Why? To keep senior men in post and give them...?
HK I think it was also a question that they could give them more money. Yes, well, put it this way… yes, you see, the difficulty was, by then, that it was still a period just like the pre-war period where to get, to have posts, was not easy and I tried once or twice, I think once for a professorship in London or so, and sometimes in Liverpool and I was always told, 'Oh yes, you are very good but we have also other people.'
O Yes, that's difficult. Too many people want to too few posts, really?
HK Well, it was yes. And of course I wasn't young any longer either you see.
O By Kosterlitz standards, you were still young?
HK Ah, but not by standards of career.
O I suppose not.
HK You see, I was 45 which was no longer young.
O You should have a chair about then, I understand that
HK It is becoming difficult. By then if there is a younger person, say who is in their later thirties or early forties… And it was not very easy at that time and then you see the whole situation was very different. If somebody comes to this country now and is a foreigner and he has work which is considered to be good, it is not very difficult for him to get a job. Now it is difficult, but say three or four years ago it wasn't. But we are now back to the early periods where it is not easy because, later on, in the '50s and '60s, it was quite easy, if there is a good man, to create a post. There was expansion...
O Yes, at the time of the Robbins Report, when they poured money into the universities.
HK And then, of course, at that time of the Robbins Report I was too senior. You see I was then a Reader I think, or something like that.
O Yes, you became a Reader in 1955
HK Yes.
O Then, until 1968, you remained as a Reader when they created the Pharmacology Professorship for you.
HK That is correct. Professor Macgregor, for whom I had a very high regard, of course he died.
O Very young, yes poor chap.
HK Well yes, he had a malformed aorta.
O Really, had he?
HK Yes, that he survived so long was quite a remarkable thing. And he had children too.
O Yes, he had children, three boys.
HK Yes, I was very fond of him. We got on exceedingly well, we were quite… But just for that reason, that when he had the first vacancy, he wouldn't appoint me.
O Really, because you were his friend and it would be awkward. I can understand that.
HK I would have been embarrassed too because there was somebody there who was actually in the Pharmacology Department as a junior person. I would have been very embarrassed but that man got a professorship, I think in Hong Kong or somewhere and so Alastair Macgregor said, 'Now you better come and develop Pharmacology,' because you see his interest was clinical pharmacology and not basic pharmacology.
O And this was now you moving into the field of drugs or had you moved into that field before then?
HK I'm just looking at the... Oh yes.
O We've jumped from 1945 when you were still doing livers.
HK Yes
O I've made too big a jump. Perhaps you'd like to take me through that.
HK No, no, because that... Well, I'll tell you afterwards. You see in that period I was already very interested in opiates and I visited the United States, I think it must have been in '61 or so, and I got a very large grant from them, which I cannot recall without looking up my records, but it was an unusually large grant and it was then I really collaborated to a great extent with people in the States.
O Ah yes, did that start at your time in Harvard in '53/'54?
HK Oh, no. In '53/'54 I never thought of opiates.
O No? You were still working on the liver and…
HK No.
O No, we've missed a bit?
HK No, no. I'd better look it up. I told you how quickly....
[Break in interview]
O Would you like to talk to me about the development of your research interests. You started off being interested in liver metabolism?
HK Liver metabolism, particularly the effect of galactose in the liver. Then, through the war years, I was interested in nutritional effects, particularly the protein in the diet. It was work done, of course, on rats where you could use high protein diets and low protein diets for longer periods. And you can examine the liver afterwards, which of course you cannot do in man. And that was until about the early '50s. Now it is then that when… this work… Miss Campbell was very important because she did most of the work in the laboratory.
O On your rats, yes?
HK Yes. Actually on the liver then, of course, liver of the rat.
O Yes, working on the liver.
HK And she was paid by the Medical Research Council. But there was, at that time, a limit on which a person could be appointed by the Medical Research Council on a temporary basis. That came to an end and she went then to the Royal Institute where she eventually retired from. And that fact, that I couldn't continue with this work made me feel, 'Now, this is probably a good time to change the subject.' Which I always felt, one shouldn't be in one subject too long and become stale and that is when I got interested in the autonomic nervous system and because I was interested in the autonomic system when I went to Harvard, not necessarily to continue work on the autonomic nervous system but Dr Krayer also was quite an expert on autonomic nervous systems, so he suggested, 'Why don't you have a look at this compound, veratramine, which does funny things?
O To cat hearts, you said?
HK Yes, it stops the heart. 'You go and investigate that, why it does it.' That was it you see.
O And how did that go on?
HK I was there for only 6 months.
O And when you came back to Aberdeen, what did you decide to study then?
HK I continued with the autonomic nervous system until I had the collaboration of my colleague, Innes… and then I started, you see, in '58, I started to become interested in the action of morphine.*
O And was that by chance? What led you into?
HK That is a very good question. It was not by chance, because in 1917, Trendelenburg who is the father of the present Trendelenburg, who is now in Wurzburg in Germany, he found that if you take a bit of gut of the guinea pig, some ileum, and you put it into an organ bath and have also fluid inside the gut, if you raise the pressure you get a contraction which moves, which is like a peristalsis, and he found that this peristalsis could be blocked by morphine in very low concentration, in concentrations which were of the order which you might get in man when you give a therapeutic dose of morphine, and that is how I got interested and I wanted to understand what is really happening. So you may say that my interest in opiates started about then.
O Yes, in 1958?
HK And we continued with this work and it was in… and then I had some person… this is a colleague here, Gordon Lees whom you know of course, he actually he…
O He starts there I think [referring to first Lees date in publication list].
HK Yes, it is then when he was a student still, and he came one day to me and he said, 'Could I not do some research with you in the holidays?' and I said 'Well come and have a look at this drug.'
O That's how you started working with him?
HK Yes. And then this is a Ghanaian chap [E.A. Gyang] who came who worked with me for about four years and you see that is why Gordon Lees and I wrote this…
O 'Analysis of the reflexes of the intestine'
HK It was a normal review
O And then you continued...?
HK Well, then I got money you see, from the United States.
O You said that was a considerable sum?
HK Yes.
O Why did they think of giving it to you. Had they read your papers, or did you know someone?
HK Well, I visited them as I told you in '61, I think it was '61 or '62.
O I don't have a record of that.
HK No. Oh look...
END OF INTERVIEW
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