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The Restoration of Frantisek Sorm

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The Restoration of Frantisek Sorm Current CX3mrnents’ EUGENE GARFIELD INSTITUTE FOR SCIENTIFIC INFORMATIONCJ S501 MARKET ST PHILADELPHIA, PA 19104 The Restoration of FrantMek ~orm: Prolific Czech Scientist Obeyed HISConscience and Became a Nonperson Number 15 April 13, 1992 ABSTRACT The life of FrantiSek ~orrn is examined, particularly during the period when he was president of the Czechoslovak Academy of Sciences and director of its Institute of Organic Chemistry and Biochemistry. His scientific achievements are discussed and an account is given of his political actions in 1968, which led to hk fall from authority. Nobelist Vladimir Prelog and Carl Djerassi contribute remembrances. “Human uniqueness, human action, and the human spirit must be rehabilitated.”1 These are the moving words of Vaclav Have], President of Czechoslovakia, speak- ing last month at the World Economic Fo- rum in Davos, Switzerland. They aptly ap- ply to the late FrantiSek Sorm, the subject of this essay, former president of the Czeehoslovak Academy of Sciences, and director of the Institute of Organic Chem- istry and Biochemistry. Sorrn was a prolific, highly cited Czech chemist whose life came apart on August 20, 1968, when Soviet tanks led a Warsaw Pact force into the narrow cobblestone streets of the baroque city of Prague. $orm, of course, is only one of a legion of con- science-obeying scientists deserving of re- habilitation in Eastern Europe. But his tale perhaps is typicrd. Frantifekform Who Was Franti3ek germ? At the end, stripped of his academy presi- for having voted in Parliament against le- dency and the institute directorship because galizing the Soviet occupation of Czecho- of his criticism of the invasion, he ended slovakia. He also voiced his protest against his days “a sad and lonely man,” according the invasion in a letter to the president of to a coworker. He remained a scientist in the Soviet Academy of Sciences. Finally, the Institute of Organic Chemistry and Bio- after suffering two heart attacks, he died chemistry, but he had few personal con- on November 18, 1980. tacts with other people. In the eyes of At the height of his administration, he officialdom, he was a nonperson, os@acized I was a man who would engage in snowball 51 battles with coworkers on noon walks to During World War II, Sorm worked as lunch. Or, in the Prague spring, climb a research chemist for a large chemical con- through ground-floor windows like a stu- cern in Prague, the Association for Chemi- dent to enter a laboratory. Initially, he be- cal and Metallurgical Production. Rudolf haved, colleagues recall, as if he were “fwst Lukei, a noted chemist, and later a profes- among equals.” His attitude to fellow sci- sor of organic chemistry, was the head of entists, however, was grounded in his per- the association laboratory and later taught sonal assessment of their abilities and quali- both Prelog and Sorm at the university. ties and sometimes quite biased. He often Prelog, who lived in Prague for nearly 10 openly criticized those he felt were inept. years, recalled his relationship with Sorm Thus, in the balance of his life, the scales “Our relationship was warm at the start, were tipped with many enemies. but cooled later on because $orm embraced At Davos, Have], once a nonperson play- the Soviet science educational system to wright himself, commented. “Communism which I was opposed,” In pmicular, Prelog was not defeated by military force, but by abhorred the separation of teaching tmiver- life, by the human spirit, by conscience, sities ffom research institutions. Prelog was by the resistance of Being and man to awarded the 1975 Nobel Prize for his con- manipulation.” tributions to the understanding of stereo- chemistry-the spatial arrangement of at- The Process of Rehabilitation oms and molecules.3 (p. 957) His recently completed autobiography was translated By 1990, the political pendulum for %IM from German by Otto Theodor Benfey of had swung to rehabilitation. On the tenth the Beckman Center for the History of anniversary of his death, led by the present Chemistry in Philadelphia.z director, Karel Martinek, the Institute of Like the majority of Czech students, Organic Chemistry and Biochemistry held Sorm was attracted by leftist political ideas a commemorative session to honor its and drawn to the then-Soviet Union. He founder. Former pupils and colleagues became a member of the Czechoslovak placed a memorial plaque to ~orm in the Communist Pwty. The party arranged for hall of the institute. Sorm to visit Moscow, and he returned im- But a plaque does not a life make. Let’s pressed by the science effort there, often Iook a little closer. Not much information lecturing on that subject. His stature thus is available on his early days. He was born grew within the party apparatus as a trusted in 1913. “Franta,” as he was sometimes science representative. called, attended the Technical University Following the communist putsch in 1948, in Prague during the early 1930s, graduat- the party, following the Soviet pattern, de- ing in 1935. He is remembered as a bright, cided to establish an Academy of Sciences. ambitious, and diligent student, “probably Sorm helped organize the new body and, the best in his class.” eventually, was rewarded with the post of I talked by telephone with the Swiss Chief Scientific Secretary (managing direc- Nobelist Vladimir Prelog, now 86, in tor) when it opened in 1952. That same Zurich. He attended the Chemical Engi- year, he assumed the directorship of the neering School of the Institute of Technol- Institute of Organic Chemistry and Bio- ogy in Prague in the late 1920s.2 (p. 7) chemistry. Prelog recalls that Sorm, who occasionally visited him in Zurich, “was not a man about Very Broad Scientific Interests whom you could easily tell anecdotes.” He was “very serious, a strong Communist, a Sorm’s scientific interests, according to fundamentalist.” Martinek, were very broad. in the field of 52 bioorgrmic chemistry, he advanced kuowl- 850 papers from 1945 to 1980, as observed edge of sesquiterpenoids, with medium-ring in the Science Citation Ina’ex@-’.His most- molecules, and explained the structure of cited first-author paper appeared in different isoprenoid compounds. He also Neoplasma, in 1964, and had 97 cites initiated the study of natural peptides, es- through 1991.4 His most-cited second- pecially neurohypophyseal hormones and authored paper, written in 1968, had 163 their analogues, some of which were shown cites by 1991.5When we published our list to be of major clinical importance. of the 1,000 most-cited contemporary au- His school of protein chemistry estab- thors in 1982, ~orm’s papers had a total of lished the primary structure of chymotryp- 4,890 citations.b From 1964 to 1967, he sin and trypsin. While studying the amino served on the editorial advisory board of acid sequence in polypeptide chains, Sorm, Index Chemicus@ published by the Insti- for the first time, deduced a tentative ge- tute for Scientific Information@-’since 1960. netic code. His studies of antimetabolites During the early years of his director- of nucleic acid constituents as potentird ship, $orm often wrote large segments of cancerostatics or virostatics led to the syn- his papers himself. Later, he would select thesis and determination of the mechanism the topic and guide the development of the of several highly active compounds, for ex- paper, eventually editing and correcting the ample, 5-azacytidine and 6-azauridine. Fi- final manuscript. In this phase, he still felt nally, he was active in the field of insect entitled to first authorship status. He never juvenile hormones. asked directly to be author when the sub- Martinek recrdls that ~orm was not a di- ject was outside his field; however, he rector who stuck to his office. He fostered clearly indicated his pleasure when his daily personal contact with the scientists name was included as a secondary author, working in the laboratories. Always eager and his displeasure when it was “forgot- to be the first to hear about new data and ten.” original evidence, he was considered to be An early riser, $orm expected his co- an outstanding theoretician as well as a workers to be on the job in the laboratories chemist and somewhat autocratic adminis- at an early hour. He liked to see his staff of @ator. some 150 scientists running severrd syn- Martinek remembers ~orm as being very theses at once. Reading newspapers in the much of a family man. His widow, Zora lab was a mortal sin, punishable by traus- ~ormov& was head of the Department of fer to a less prestigious institution. He ex- Biochemistry within the institute. A short pected library research to be done on week- time after Sorm’s dismissai as director, she ends. retired for reasons of health. Their daugh- ter, Zora, today is a physician, and their Djerassi Reeds ~orm Meetings son, Milan, a sculptor. A gmd pianist k I have more than once visited Prague on W= fond of music, particularly the work of business. But I never had the occasion to Jan&k. Duringhis lastyears,he enjoyedcook- meet ~orm. During my visit to Prague two ing unconventionalmeais for his family. years ago to give a paper at an intern- ationalconference, I attempted unsuccess- Author of 1,(KIOPapers fully to locate his widow and children. I Sorm was a voracious reader, often also had an appointment with Martinek, but spending his weekends keeping abreast of he was unable to keep it because of an the scientific literature and writing. Indeed, automobile accident. He and others have his name appears as fwst author on more supplied the details for this $orm portrait. than 150 papers, and second author on over Perhaps one day a qualified biographer will 3 do justice to his turbulent carexx.The Ameri- me not to go, but 1 was curious to learn can chemist Carl Djerassi has documented fust-hand what was going on.
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