Hans Laufer

With much sadness, the MBL shares the passing of Hans Laufer, 94, a longtime MBL community member and former MBL Trustee, Society member, Whitman scientist, and course faculty member/alumnus. Laufer, who died on August 17, was professor emeritus of molecular and cell biology at the University of Connecticut. The MBL flag will be lowered in his memory.

Born in Germany, Laufer and his family immigrated to the United States following Kristallnacht. He graduated from Stuyvesant High School and City College of New York before earning a PhD in biology from Cornell University in 1957.

Laufer first came to the MBL in 1956 to attend the Embryology course as the recipient of an E.G. Conklin Fellowship award. In the course, Laufer met faculty member (and later MBL director) James Ebert, who offered him a postdoctoral position at Johns Hopkins University. Laufer came back to teach in the Embryology course in 1966 and served on its faculty through 1970.

Laufer’s early research focused on insect endocrinology but he spent most of his career studying crustaceans. His interests included gene regulation during development and reproduction, hormonal and molecular interactions, and comparative endocrinology of invertebrates.

Among the research highlights Laufer described in this MBL History Project video interview are discovery of the juvenile hormone in crustaceans, which regulates both reproduction and development, and a method for enhancing reproduction in shrimp, which he patented through the University of Connecticut. In later years, Laufer studied the impact of environmental pollutants that mimic hormone activity, such as bisphenol A from degraded plastics, on lobsters and other crustaceans. His work showed that very small amounts of bisphenol A have toxic effects on crustacean larvae.

In addition to his research and teaching activities at MBL, Laufer was a former member of the laboratory’s Executive Committee and a member of the Advisory Council to former MBL Director Paul Gross. Together with his late wife, Evelyn (Green) Laufer, he was active with the MBL Associates.

Laufer lived in Storrs, Conn., and also had a home in Woods Hole. He leaves his children, Jessica, Marc and Leonard Laufer; and six grandchildren, Isaac, Emma, Isabella, Alexandra, Arianna and Eli.

An obituary in the Falmouth Enterprise is here.