Johann Lukas Schönlein
Quick Facts
Biography
Johann Lukas Schönlein (30 November 1793 – 23 January 1864) was a German naturalist, and professor of medicine, born in Bamberg. He studied medicine at Landshut, Jena, Göttingen, and Würzburg. After teaching at Würzburg and Zurich, he was called to Berlin in 1839, where he taught therapeutics and pathology. He served as physician to Frederick William IV.
Work
He was one of the first German medical professors to lecture in the native tongue instead of Latin. Schönlein described purpura rheumatica (Schönlein's disease) an allergic non-thrombopenic purpura rash that became known as Henoch–Schönlein purpura, though now known as IgA vasculitis. He also discovered the parasitic cause of ringworm or favus (Trichophyton schönleinii).
J. L. Schönlein is also attributed with naming the disease, Tuberculosis, in 1839. Prior to Schönlein's designation, Tuberculosis had been called "consumption".