Dr Christian Reiß
Research Assistant and Academic Adviser
Email: christian.reiss (at) psk.uni-regensburg.de
Room: PT 4.3.16
Telephone: +49 941 943-3642
Office hours
Every Tuesday from 11.00 am to 12.00 pm
Please book in advance by email
Curriculum Vitae
Member of the University of Regensburg’s Sustainability Councilsince March 2025
2022–2023: Member of the ‘Structure and Development Plan’ working group at the Faculty of PKGG
2020–2023 Head (jointly with Dr Carmen Dexl) of the research network “Knowledge Infrastructures: Circulation, Transfer and Translation of Knowledge across Borders” (KNOW-IN)
2018–2023 Review editor for the journal *NTM – Journal for the History of Science, Technology and Medicine*
Since 2016: Research Assistant at the Chair of History of Science at the University of Regensburg (Prof. Dr Omar W. Nasim)
2014–2016 Research Associate at the Chair of the History of Science at the University of Regensburg (Prof. Dr Christoph Meinel)
2014 Awarded a Dr. rer. nat. from the Faculty of Biology and Pharmacy at Friedrich Schiller University, Jena, for a thesis entitled: “The History of the Mexican Axolotl as a Laboratory Animal, 1864–1914: Routes of dissemination, infrastructures, research priorities” (awarded the 2015 Young Researchers’ Prize of the German Society for the History of Medicine, Natural Sciences and Technology (shared) and the 2015 Caspar-Friedrich-Wolff Medal of the German Society for the History and Theory of Biology)
2007–2013 PhD student at the Max Planck Institute for the History of Science, Berlin, on the project ‘The Experimentalisation of Life – Configurations between Science, Art and Technology’ (Department III: Prof. Dr Hans-Jörg Rheinberger)
2007 Research assistant in the Biology Education Working Group at Friedrich Schiller University, Jena (Prof. Dr Uwe Hoßfeld)
Until 2007: Studied Biology, History of Science and Technology, Biological Anthropology and Intercultural Business Communication in Bayreuth and Jena, . Qualification: Magister scientiarum from Friedrich Schiller University, Jena (thesis title: ‘Experiment and Ontogeny – The developmental biology work of Haeckel’s student Julius Schaxel, 1918–1928’)
Key areas
History of the Life Sciences, 18th–21st Centuries
Historiography and Theory (in) the History of Science
History of Ecology and Ecological Thought
History of laboratory animals, the laboratory and experimentation in the life sciences
Early cinematography in the life sciences
Environmental History
History of bioinformatics/cybernetics
Publications
Books
Reiß, Christian (2020): The Axolotl: A Laboratory Animal in the Home Aquarium,
1864–1914, Göttingen: Wallstein.
Reviewed in: History and Philosophy of the Life Sciences (external link, opens in a new window), sehepunkte (external link, opens in a new window), Der Standard (external link, opens in a new window), Biospektrum (external link, opens in a new window), NTM (external link, opens in a new window), Mitteldeutsche Zeitung, Aquaristik-Fachmagazin
Edited volumes
Becker, Andreas and Christian Reiß (eds.) (2021): Imre Tóth (1921–2010) and the Institutionalisation of the History of Science at the University of Regensburg, Vol. 3, Publications of the University of Regensburg Archives, Regensburg: University of Regensburg Press.
Cakes and Candies – On the History of Laboratory Animal Nutrition, Reports on the History of Science 35(4) 2012 (together with Martina Schlünder, Axel C. Hüntelmann and Susanne Bauer)
(Virtual) Exhibitions
Becker, Andreas; Reiß, Christian; Wenninger, Eleyne (2021): “A Life Between Art and Science: Imre Tóth (1921–2010)”. https://www.uni-regensburg.de/bibliothek/imretoth/startseite/index.html (external link, opens in a new window)
Blog post on the special exhibition ‘Ad Astra. 50 Years of the Friends of the Regensburg Observatory Association’ “From Seminar to Museum – How an Exhibition Came About with the Involvement of Many People” (external link, opens in a new window)
Essays
Huenniger, Dominik, Karina Lucas Silva-Brandão, Christian Reiß and Xiaoya Zhan (2024): A Collection Ecologies Forum: Re-evaluating Insects as Archives, *Isis* 115(1), pp. 157–163.
Reiss, Christian (2024): ‘Living more beautifully and living better. Hans Sedlmayr’s reflections on modern art, as well as on the preservation of monuments and nature conservation in the context of the organisist biophilosophy of the Weimar Republic’, *Recherches germaniques* HS 19, pp. 125–140.
Reiß, Christian (2023): Frisch, Karl Ritter von – Deutsche Biographie, https://www.deutsche-biographie.de/pnd118693670.html (external link, opens in a new window) (accessed 6 September 2023).
Reiß, Christian (2023): What is Biology, c. 1956? The Science of Life in Intellectual Discourses in Germany and Austria before and after 1945, in: Ash, Mitchell G. and Juliane Mikoletzky (eds.): From a Science of Life to the Life Sciences in Central Europe, Vienna [et al.]: LIT Verlag, pp. 129–144, https://lit-verlag.de/isbn/978-3-643-51167-6/ (external link, opens in a new window).
Reiß, Christian (2022): ‘Cut and Paste: The Mexican Axolotl, Experimental Practices and the Long History of Regeneration Research in Amphibians, 1864–Present’, Frontiers in Cell and Developmental Biology 10, https://doi.org/10.3389/fcell.2022.786533 (external link, opens in a new window).
Reiß, Christian (2022): From Existential Knowledge to Experimental Practice: The Mexican Axolotl, the Paris Ménagerie, and the Epistemic Benefits of Keeping Unknown Animals, 1850–1876, Centaurus 64(3), pp. 615–634.
Reiß, Christian (2022): From Organismic Biology as History and Philosophy to the History and Philosophy of Biology—the Work of Hans-Jörg Rheinberger in the German Context**, Berichte zur Wissenschaftsgeschichte 45(3), pp. 384–396.
Reiß, Christian (2022): Writing the History of Animals in Latin America, in: Barahona, Ana (ed.): Handbook of the Historiography of Latin American Studies on the Life Sciences and Medicine, Historiographies of Science, Cham: Springer, doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-48616-7_10-1.
Reiß, Christian (2021): Shooting Chicken Embryos: The Making of Ludwig Gräper’s Embryological Films, 1911–1940, *Isis* 112(2), pp. 299–306.
Reiß, Christian et al. (2021): Between Reform and Tradition – On the History of the Discipline of the History of Science at the University of Regensburg, in: Becker, Andreas and Christian Reiß (eds.): Imre Tóth (1921–2010) and the Institutionalisation of the History of Science at the University of Regensburg, Vol. 3, Publications of the University of Regensburg Archives, Regensburg: University of Regensburg Press.
Geißler, Peter and Christian Reiß (2021): ‘Miss von Chauvin and the Mystery of Transformation’, *elaphe* 2015(5), pp. 54–67.
Reiß, Christian (2020): Building, Living, Life, cache 1, pp. 100–101. https://cache.ch/blog/bauenwohnenleben (external link, opens in a new window)
Reiß, Christian (2017): The History of Biology between Animal and Environmental History. The Mexican Axolotl as a Historical Actor, in: Michael Kaasch; Joachim Kaasch and Torsten K.D. Himmel (eds.): Biology in the GDR. Papers from the 24th Annual Conference of the DGGTB in Greifswald 2015, Berlin: VWB – Verlag für Wissenschaft und Bildung, pp. 321–340.
Reiß, Christian (2017): The Biologische Versuchsanstalt as a Techno-Natural Assemblage: Artificial Environments, Animal Husbandry and the Challenges of Experimental Biology, in: Gerd B. Müller (ed.): Vivarium. Experimental, Quantitative, and Theoretical Biology at Vienna’s Biologische Versuchsanstalt, Cambridge: MIT Press, pp. 115–132.
Reiß, Christian; Uwe Hoßfeld and Lennart Olsson (2016): The Mexican axolotl as a laboratory animal through the ages, BIOspektrum 22(6), pp. 660–661.
Reiß, Christian; Lennart Olsson and Uwe Hoßfeld (2015): The History of the Oldest Self-Sustaining Laboratory Animal: 150 Years of Axolotl Research, Journal of Experimental Zoology 324(5), pp. 393–404.
Reiß, Christian; Uwe Hoßfeld and Lennart Olsson (2014): Between the Laboratory and the Aquarium, or: How an Amphibian Conquered the World. 150 Years of the Axolotl, Biology in Our Time 44, pp. 188–195.
Reiß, Christian and Mareike Vennen (2014): Muddy Waters. The Aquarium as a Space for (Proto)Ecological Knowledge, 1850–1877, in: Kijan Espahangizi and Barbara Orland (eds.): Substances in Motion. Essays on a History of Science of the Material World, Berlin: Diaphanes, pp. 121–142.
Reiß, Christian (2014): August Weismann’s Early Evolutionary Research: Experiment and Theory in an Artificial Natural Environment, Rudolstadt Natural History Papers 20, pp. 11–29.
Reiß, Christian (2012): ‘Gateway, Instrument, Environment: The Aquarium as a Hybrid Space between Animal Fancying and Experimental Zoology’, *NTM Zeitschrift für Geschichte der Wissenschaften, Technik und Medizin* 24, pp. 309–336.
Reiß, Christian (2012): How Zoology Learnt to Feed Animals. Animal Nutrition in 19th-Century Zoology, Reports on the History of Science 35, pp. 286–299.
Reiß, Christian (2011): Axolotl, in: Department III of the Max Planck Institute for the History of Science (eds.): A Natural History for the 21st Century. In Honour of Hans-Jörg Rheinberger, Berlin: Self-published, pp. 132–134.
Merlin, Francesca; Dan Nicholson; Christian Reiß; Aleksandra Sojic and Joeri Witteveen (2008): ‘Emergent Philosophy of Biology in Europe’, *Biological Theory* 3, pp. 391–392.
Reiß, Christian; Uwe Hoßfeld; Lennart Olsson; Georgy S. Levit and Oliver Lemuth (2008): The autobiographical manuscript of developmental biologist Julius Schaxel dated 24 July 1938 – An attempt at contextualisation, Annals of the History and Philosophy of Biology 13, pp. 4–52.
Reiß, Christian (2008): Reread – Bruno Latour: Visualisation and Cognition: Drawing Things Together; Bruno Latour: The ‘Pedologist’s Thread’ of Boa Vista – A Photo-Philosophical Montage, Bildwelten des Wissens 6,1, pp. 120–121.
Reiß, Christian (2007): No Evolution, No Heredity, Just Development—Julius Schaxel and the End of the Evo–Devo Agenda in Jena, 1906–1933: A Case Study, *Theory in Biosciences* 126, pp. 155–164.
Reiß, Christian; Susan Springer; Uwe Hoßfeld; Lennart Olsson and Georgy S. Levit (2007): ‘Introduction to the Autobiography of Julius Schaxel’, Theory in Biosciences 126, pp. 165–175.
Markert, Michael; Christian Reiß and Enrico Kusch (2006): The Experiment as a Didactic Approach to the History of Science, DGGMNT Newsletter 56, p. 231.
Reviews
Finkelstein, Gabriel. *Emil du Bois-Reymond. Neuroscience, Self, and Society in Nineteenth-Century Germany*. Cambridge [et al.]: MIT Press, 2013. *Centaurus* 57(1), pp. 35–36
Nyhart, Lynn. *Modern Nature: The Rise of the Biological Perspective in Germany*. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 2009. *Journal of Interdisciplinary History* 41(1), pp. 147–148.
Endersby, Jim. A Guinea Pig’s History of Biology. The Animals and Plants that Taught us the Facts of Life. London : William Heinemann, 2007. NTM – Journal for the History of Science, Technology and Medicine 16(3), pp. 411–412.
Translations
Landecker, Hannah (2013) The (Self-)Life of Movement. From microkinematography to live-cell imaging. In: Sigrid Leyssen and Pirkko Rathgeber (eds.) Bilder animierter Bewegung/Images of Animate Movement. Munich: Fink, pp. 274–306
Lectures
How does a new scientific discipline emerge? – August Thienemann (1882–1960) and German-language ecology. Lecture as part of the Plön Winter Talks 2024/2025, Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Biology, Plön, 25 February 2025 (invited)
Managed Environments in the cache: A History of Environmental Knowledge at the Meso-level (in collaboration with Dr Nils Güttler). Workshop “Perspectives on a History of Ecological Knowledge”, Leuphana University of Lüneburg, 22–23 March 2023 (invited)
Hedges, Forests, Lakes. Reflections on a History of Ecology as an Administrative Science, c. 1907–1963. GWU Colloquium, Bielefeld University, 25 October 2022 (invited)
Living more beautifully or living better? On the manifold interconnections between organismic biology, biophilosophy and (post)modern architecture in the Federal Republic of Germany, 1945–1975. Workshop “The Naturalisation of the Arts. Anthropology and Aesthetics (1850 to the present day) / La naturalisation des arts. Anthropologie et esthétique (de 1850 à aujourd’hui)”. University of Regensburg, 6–7 October 2022 (invited)
Commentary on the Lectures and the Epistemology and Mediality of Materials. Workshop “Materials Matter.” Cluster of Excellence “Matters of Activity – Image Space Material”, Humboldt University of Berlin, 4–5 May 2022 (invited)
Neo-Kantianism, Phenomenology and Organismic Biology: The History of the ‘Other’ Philosophy of Biology. Workshop “History and Historiography of the Life Sciences: Traces of Hans-Jörg Rheinberger”, Max Planck Institute for the History of Science, Berlin, 6–8 April 2022 (invited)
Samoa-Sunda-Posen. German ecology as a colonial science, 1906–1945. Lecture series “Science and Medicine in German Colonialism”, University of Regensburg, 30 November 2021 (invited)
“What is Biology?”, c. 1956? The science of life in intellectual discourses in Germany and Austria in the post-war period. Symposium: From the Science of Life to the Life Sciences in Central Europe – Contributions from the History of Science. Ignaz Lieben Society, Vienna, 14–16 October 2021
Organism, Life and Environment. Biophilosophical Contributions to the Interdisciplinary Culture of Debate in the Early Federal Republic. Workshop “Biophilosophies. On the connection between the humanities and natural sciences ‘après la lettre’”, Ernst Haeckel House, Friedrich Schiller University Jena, 30 September 2021 (workshop co-organised with Julia Gruevska)
The many scales of behaviour. Ethology, “organismic biology” and the formation of biology in the German-speaking world after 1945. Panel: Scaling Behavioural Knowledge after 1945. German Ethology between Zoological Research and Sociological Interventions (co-organised with Sophia Gräfe). GWMT Annual Conference, Vienna, 17–19 September 2021
Ecology as an administrative science. Counting animals and plants – mainly insects – in the Federal Republic of Germany after 1945. Workshop “Environmental Governance. Experience, Knowledge, Expectations since 1945.” Centre for Contemporary History, Potsdam, 16–17 September 2021
Transatlantic ‘Exchange of Ideas’. The publication, translation and reception of Ludwik Fleck’s *The Formation and Development of a Scientific Fact* in Germany, the USA and Great Britain, 1975–1982 (together with Eleyne Wenninger). Workshop: History of Historical Science Studies in the Long 20th Century. University of Wuppertal, 2–3 September 2021
François Jacob’s *The Logic of Life* and the End of Life in the German Life Sciences. The Logic of Life 50 Years On: Reflecting on the History of Biology with François Jacob, Ernst-Haeckel-Haus, Jena, Friedrich Schiller University of Jena, 18–19 June 2021
Of Humans and Mice: The History of Science in the Laboratory as a History of Relationships. Lecture series “Distant Relatives – Animals and Humans”. University of Regensburg, 3 February 2021 (invited)
Fields, Rays and Entelechy: ‘Theoretical Biology’ and the Quest for
Non-Mechanistic Ontologies in the German Life Sciences c. 1900–1945.
Symposium “On Activity”, Cluster of Excellence “Matters of Activity • Image
Space Material’ at HU Berlin, 7 February 2020 (invited)
Helmuth Plessner and the Life Sciences. From the theoretical
biology of the Weimar Republic to the zoology of man in Göttingen
in 1961. Contexts and Corrections: Workshop on Helmuth Plessner’s Göttingen
lecture on philosophical anthropology in 1961,
Albert Ludwig University of Freiburg im Breisgau, 25–26 June 2019 (invited)
Practices of the Living. Organism | Environment | Human, 1918–1956.
Colloquium organised by the Chair of Science Studies, ETH Zurich,
6 March 2019 (invited)
The Axolotl in the Aquarium: On the Animal and Environmental History of a
laboratory organism and its artificial natural habitat, c. 1864–1914.
Colloquium organised by the Institute for the History, Theory and Ethics of Medicine,
Heinrich Heine University Düsseldorf, 28 November 2018 (invited)
The Axolotl in the Aquarium: On the Animal and Environmental History of a
laboratory organism and its artificial natural habitat, c. 1864–1914.
‘Human-Animal Studies’ Section of the Giessen Graduate Centre for Social,
Economics and Law (GGS), Justus Liebig University
Giessen, 23 May 2017 (invited)
Chicks in 3D. Ludwig Gräper’s microcinematographic work
between research into developmental mechanics and medical education.
Workshop ‘Educational Film, Research Film, Methodological Film? Forms and Functions
of early scientific film’, Berlin, 1 July 2016 (invited)
Artificial Natural Spaces. Reflections on a historical ecology of the
laboratory in the life sciences, c. 1800–2000.
Young Researchers’ Forum on the History of Science, Leopoldina – National Academy
of Sciences, Halle, 11–12 April 2016. (invited)
Mobilising and Immobilising Aquatic Life in the Museum (jointly with
Mareike Vennen). Conference “Knowing Things. Circulations and Transitions
of Objects in Natural History”, Museum für Naturkunde Berlin, Berlin,
23 March 2015–24 March 2015
The aquarium as a scientific experiment and an artificial environment:
Marie von Chauvin’s experimental research into reproduction,
development and evolution of amphibians, 1874–1885. Perspectives on the
History of Science. Colloquium organised by the Chair of
History of Science, Ludwig Maximilian University of Munich,
18 December 2014 (invited)
From chemico-theological homeostasis to (proto)ecological
circulation: The aquarium as a model and medium for natural systems,
1850–1914 (in collaboration with Mareike Vennen, Weimar). Authors’ workshop: ‘Substances
in Motion. A Historical Epistemology of the Material World,
Centre for the History of Knowledge (ETH & University of Zurich), 6–7 April 2013
From the zebrafish to the axolotl: How the aquarium breathed life into biology
. Colloquium organised by the Chair of History of Science,
University of Regensburg, 23 November 2011 (invited)
Of Axolotls and Men, or How the Aquarium Brought Life to the Life
Sciences, 1864–1900. Session: Towards an Historical Ecology of
Research Environments. (Organisers: Kijan Espahangizi, Christian
Reiß). 2011 History of Science Society Annual Meeting, Cleveland,
3–6 November 2011
Live and Let Live: Reflections on an Environmental History of the
laboratory. Colloquium on the History of Science. Institute for
Science and Technology Studies, Bielefeld University, 5 July 2011
(invited)
How zoology learnt to feed. The feeding of exotic
laboratory animals in the 19th century: the case of the Mexican axolotl.
Session: Cakes and Candies: A Hunger for Knowledge in the Laboratory. On the history of
feeding of laboratory animals (Organisers: Martina Schlünder, Christian
Reiß). Annual Conference of the DGGMNT, Maastricht, 24–26 September 2010
The Ontologies of Life and Death: The Infrastructures of Early
Experimental Life Sciences. The Future of Medical History Conference,
London, 15–17 July 2010
The Productivity of Cut-and-Paste: The Mexican Axolotl, Regeneration
Research and the Importance of Experimental Practices. BSHS Annual
Conference 2010, Aberdeen, 22–25 July 2010
The Mexican Axolotl’s Long History as an Experimental Animal. Society
for Philosophy of Science in Practice Second Biennial Conference,
Minneapolis, 18–20 June 2009
A Curiosity Becomes Standard: On the Mexican Axolotl’s Journey from
‘Nature’ to Scientific and Popular ‘Culture’, c. 1860–1900. Session:
Animals, Biologists and their Common Habitat (Organisers: Raf de Bont,
Christian Reiss). 2008 History of Science Society Annual Meeting,
Pittsburgh, 6–9 November 2008
How did scientists construct the future of their experimental systems?
ScienceFutures, Swiss STS Meeting 2008, Zurich, 6–9 February 2008
Julius Schaxel and the Emergence of Organicism in Germany, 1910–1933.
ISHPSSB conference 2007, Exeter, 25–29 July 2007
Ernst Haeckel’s Legacy Revisited: Julius Schaxel’s Developmental
Biology at the University of Jena, 1918–1928. 1st Meeting of the European
Society for Evolutionary Developmental Biology, Prague, 16–19 August 2006