Ulrich Loening
1931 – 2025
On July 10, 2025, after a short illness, ENSSER member Ulrich Loening passed away peacefully, surrounded by his family in his home in Ormiston, Scotland. At 94 years of age, he looked back on a life very rich in experiences, not only in his beloved research field of biology, but also in his extensive contacts with other scientists. These contacts, from which he often quoted to us in our online meetings, illustrated one of his most remarkable properties: he was on perfectly sociable terms with many, if not most, of the scientists and others he contacted, even if they had views at odds with or directly opposing his own. This property is very conducive to enriching one’s own views by learning from others, but also to gaining recognition from others for one’s own views. Both are important for moving scientific frontiers. Perhaps Ulrich’s most important legacy are his ideas about science needing to become ‘convivial’, i.e. in harmony with life. It is probably no exaggeration to say that Ulrich was one of the greatest minds we had the good luck to have among us within ENSSER.
Sociable as he was, he took part enthusiastically in many different online and in person meetings of ENSSER. Many of us got to know him well this way, and some of us found beautiful words for their feelings on Ulrich’s passing, which I quote here:
“He was a very special person, and we all carry a little of Ulrich with us. He will be missed, but he is not gone.”
“You were always a favourite colleague in our discussion groups. With your active arguments but also careful and humble. I want to be old in the same way as you. Long white hair, engaged, sharp and playing cello. Miss you!”
“I learned so much from his speeches.”
“I was impressed in our many distant exchanges [with] the very kind way of disagreeing (the best of a British tradition, I must admit) and how he could slowly push the possibly wrong argument of the others towards a new way of looking at matters.”
“Ulrich will never be forgotten. His final explanation for “con vivo” summarizes the spirit in which he lived – he was in tune with nature, in awe of the many mysteries and unknowns, and always remained a humble student.”
“What a knowledgable, intelligent and clear-headed man he was. And thanks for sending us the link to his wonderful talk in Athens. About biochemistry when it was more than DNA.”
“Ulrich was a very good, kind and thoughtful man. He will be sadly missed by so many people.”
We were lucky enough to still have him among us in person at our recent conference in Athens, 15 – 17 May. Apart from his lecture (ppt), he did not hesitate to loudly intervene in a panel discussion when he thought a thinking error was being made in an economic consideration about organic agriculture. Also at the conference, his brilliant dinner speech (available for listening back here) will never be forgotten by many of us. Focusing on the challenge to scientists to ‘spot the elephants in the room’ (the aspects that we tend to overlook when considering a topic), he paid ENSSER a huge compliment in this speech by suggesting that we re-interpret our name to mean “European Network of Scientists for Spotting Elephants in the Room”.