Recollecting Hanns Hippius: a stimulating pioneer of psychopharmacology and neuroscience.

Abstract

Hanns Hippius (1925-2021) can be seen as a stimulating pioneer of Psychopharmacology and of Neuroscience. He was very influential in this area not only in Germany, but also on an international level. With reference to clinical psychopharmacology especially his activities for the development of Clozapine are of greatest importance. When he became Chairman of the Psychiatric Department of the Ludwig-Maximilians-University Munich (1971-1994), he established all necessary facilities for research in Psychopharmacology and Neuroscience, which was at that time a great progress in psychiatry. This was the base to establish a Munich school of clinical psychopharmacology and neuroscience. A majority of his co-workers did research in psychopharmacology and neuroscience and made their academic careers in this area and several achieved university chair positions in Germany, on which they could procreate the standards and knowledge of the Munich school of psychopharmacology and neuroscience. His engagement for psychopharmacology can be seen in addition in the fact that he was co-founder and one of the first presidents of CINP (1972-1974), the International College of Psychopharmacology. The recollections presented in this article describe the objective data as well as some personal experiences of the author.