Professor Dr Paul Julian Weindling

Research Priorities: History of eugenics, medicine under National Socialism, medical human experiments, coerced research, development of medical ethics
Paul Weindling is a British medical historian. He is globally renowned as a leading expert in the history of science and medicine under National Socialism. One focus of his research is medical human experiments under National Socialism (NS) and the development of medical ethics. He is particularly concerned with shedding light on the suffering and history of the victims of NS coerced research.
He conducted key studies on the development of eugenics as a scientifically legitimised form of “racial hygiene” under the NS regime. He has analysed the eugenic movements of the 19th and early 20th centuries, their relationship to international philanthropy, including the Rockefeller Foundation in the USA, and their influence on health policy.
One of his concerns is to shed light on the victims of human experiments under National Socialism and to document their suffering and biographies. With his research on the Nuremberg Doctors’ Trial he reconstructed the victims’ perspectives and examined the prosecution of NS coerced research. 
He examined the history of the Kaiser Wilhelm Society, known today as the Max Planck Society, under National Socialism, and co-led the project “Brain research at Institutes of the Kaiser Wilhelm Society in the context of National Socialist injustices”. This involved researching the origins of brain tissue samples that came from victims of the NS regime. Paul Weindling and his team conducted meticulous research to compile and document biographical data on over 30,000 of victims of NS coerced research as well as on the persons and institutions responsible.
The data is accessible and available for further research in the database “Victims of Biomedical Research under National Socialism”, affiliated with the Leopoldina. Paul Weindling’s research created the first empirical basis and systematic representation of NS coerced research while also documenting the various victim groups and their suffering.