Karl Friedrich Theodor Krause

Biography of Karl Friedrich Theodor Krause

Karl Friedrich Theodor Krause was important as a practising physician and health official. He first attended the anatomical school in Hannover under the Leibchirurgicus Georg Karl Ludwig Wedemeyer (1792-1829) and participated in the Hanoverian army as Unterwundarzt in the campaign in Belgium in 1815. From 1816 he studied in Göttingen and obtained his doctorate in 1818. In 1820, following a journey to Italy, he settled as a succesful practitioner in Hannover. Soon afterwards he was entrusted the chair of anatomy at the reorganized surgical school in Hannover, as well as public positions. In 1852 he assumed the highest position of this kind in Hannover, that of Director des Ober-Medicinal-Collegiums. He held his professorship in anatomy until 1851, when the surgical school was closed. He had, however, already some years previously had to reduce his teaching activity, when has was called to the Ober-medicinalcollegium. His contributions count among those of the best anatomist of his time.

Krause was one of the first to use the microscope consequently - and successfully in his anatomical investigations. He was the first to demonstrate the transverse striated fibres of the musculature of the heart.